Fiber line break causes Docomo outage

Docomo subscribers in the CNMI experienced a temporary connection disruption last Friday due to what Docomo Pacific CNMI said was caused by an “inadvertent fiber line break.”

The disruption has since been fixed, with Docomo Pacific CNMI’s Facebook page reporting that internet, mobile and cable TV services were restored at 10:11pm Friday night and home phone services were reconnected at 1:30am early Saturday morning.

Based on the comments posted on Docomo Pacific CNMI’s Facebook page, the network issue lasted until Saturday morning in some areas. The issue caused unreliable mobile, office and home phone access, and zero internet access, including cable TV services.

Docomo Pacific CNMI posted on its Facebook page on Friday night that the Docomo tech team worked overnight since Friday to get subscribers reconnected.

According to a Docomo Pacific Inc. subscriber Janine Ramos, the disruption occurred at around 3pm Friday. “It happened at a time when we are busy at work, trying to accomplish sheets before the work week ends and was heavily dependent on the internet in the office. Our lines were down, I wasn’t receiving calls or texts and couldn’t send them as well. It just paralyzed work from there,” she said.

Maria Valenzuela was worried that she was holding up the line at the grocery because she was paying with her credit card. “The cashier was having a hard time with credit card transactions because she said the internet was slow. But I had no cash and was left with no choice. It took a couple minutes before my card went through,” she said.

A comment posted by a Kelly Marie Dignadice on Docomo Pacific Inc.’s Facebook page said, “Thank you for the update. I can’t do my homework and I have a test due tonight.” The company apologized and assured Dignadice that they are working on network restoration.

The outage also happened at a time of the rising conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Reports of cyberattacks by Russia inflicted upon U.S. companies and offices were so rampant that Damian Santos of Chalan Kanoa thought that the CNMI technology and networks were being attacked. “Thinking that it may be a cyberattack, I withdrew some money from the ATM because bank accounts are first to shut down when a cyberattack occurs. I’m glad it wasn’t that,” he said

Another service provider in the CNMI, IT&E also experienced service interruption but it was limited only to their call center and prepaid services. In a message posted on their Facebook page last Friday, it said, “Callers are unable to connect to IT&E call center representatives and all prepaid services have been affected.” A few hours later, they posted that those issues have been resolved.

IT&E subscriber Jasmin Cabrera said she did not have any issues with her mobile, internet and cable TV access “I work from home and nothing went wrong with my connection. I remember trying to connect with friends who are Docomo subscribers and my calls were dropped and texts unsent. I found out later that their network was having problems.”

Docomo network connection is mow back to normal. Saipan Tribune reached out to Docomo Pacific Inc. for further updates but didn’t get a response as of press time.