Fire Leaves Midtown Verizon Customers Without Service
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Thousands of Midtown businesses and residences that have been without telephone, e-mail, and Internet service for the past 10 days may have to wait another 10 days until service is fully restored.
Last Tuesday, an underground fire in Midtown destroyed copper cables that carry telephone service and some of the Internet services provided by Verizon, one of the city’s largest carriers.
A company spokeswoman, Lark-Marie Anton, said yesterday that repairs have been slowed by the extent of the damage, environmental concerns in the two days after the fire, and very wet weather. She said repair crews are working “around the clock” to restore service to 10,000 customers.
Ms. Anton would not say when service would be fully restored, but Verizon has told some customers that service may not return until October 24, which is 20 days after the fire. In the meantime, it is far from business as usual for some Midtown tenants who are scrambling to maintain productivity.
The telephone and Internet outages were concentrated in the Midtown area, but other customers farther from the fire have also been affected. Businesses and residences that use a service provider that links to Verizon infrastructure also have experienced problems.
An employee with the Association of Executive Search Consultants, Chris Sederstrom, said the outages have resulted in lost time and money. Mr. Sederstrom said Verizon has pushed back estimates on when service would be restored.
Ms. Anton said 10,000 customers were affected initially and some have had service restored. For two days, repair crews were not permitted to get to the damaged area because of the danger of lingering fumes. The cause of the fire has not been determined. The president of Commercial Tenant Real Estate Representation, Marisa Manley, said her company has lost “tens of thousands” of dollars in wages she has paid employees who have been paralyzed by the outages.
Ms. Anton said that each customer’s case will be reviewed to determine whether they will be billed as normal or credited against future charges.
