A construction crew doing work on Queensway left 4,800 Telus customers with limited phone service Thursday (July 14).
Calling into the exchange from telephones outside the 898 area was impossible through the morning and those inside the exchange had challenges making calls out.
The construction crew dug up a fibre optic cable at 9 a.m. and Shaw Hall of Telus said his company's crew faced a complicated repair job because 150 metres of cable had to be replaced.
Service was restored to phone customers by about 2 p.m.
Cpl. Dave Ritchie said the service outage left a small pocket of residents without the ability to use 911. He said the RCMP sent a message through local radio that those in the affected area needing emergency help had to use a cell phone or some other means of reporting emergencies.
14-year-old rescued
An injured girl hiking with a group based at the Evans Lake camp was taken out of the wilderness in the middle of the night, after the girl fell and suffered minor injuries.
Nathan Dubeck of the 撸奶社区Emergency Program said locating the girl Thursday and into Friday (July 7 and 8) was a challenge, because her precise location wasn't known.
Through the use of a cell phone on the fringe of service, an adult with the hiking group led search and rescue volunteers to the girl at a small lake between Lewis Lake and Butterfly Lake.
The Lower Mainland girl went to 撸奶社区General Hospital with shoulder and neck injuries.
