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Openserve repairs delayed by flooding in Gauteng

Earlier this week Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal were rocked by severe storms.

While the South African Weather Services have been careful not to call the storm a tornado having been literal metres from the storm I can confidently say that the winds we saw were not just a “storm”.

The aftermath of the heavy winds and rain have wrought havoc on infrastructure such as power and telecommunications.

Openserve – a division of Telkom – has said that the heavy rains led to flooding of some of the firms underground infrastructure.

“The flooding has restricted workmen from accessing the fault zone and will cause delays in repair times,” said Openserve in a media statement.

Openserve is still assessing the extent of the damage in KwaZulu-Natal.

The firm says that in both Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal overhead cables have been damaged by falling trees and lightning.

“The Company understands the great inconvenience disconnection of its services brings to its clients and their customers and will be on extra high alert during this period, mobilising all available technicians to work additional hours if needs be,” Openserve’s chief of operations Lucas Ndala said.

The COO added that backup generators had been dispatched to key Openserve infrastructure sites to keep services running for up to eight hours in the event of a power failure.

We understand that not having internet is frustrating but we urge our readers to have a degree of patience given the unique nature of the damage and what caused it. While you might have come away unscathed there are areas where folks can’t even live in their own houses anymore.

Openserve has asked residents and businesses on its network to report faults to their respective service providers if they have not already.

[Image – CC BY 0 Pixabay]

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