FairPoint Communications Internet service is down. The outage is affecting customers in Vermont and New Hampshire.
Jeff Nevins, a spokesman for the company, says workers are making repairs.
FairPoint has developed a “temporary solution.” Nevins said, “that may not be visible to customers.”
“We experienced a hardware issue during routine maintenance earlier this morning that caused an Internet outage for customers in Vermont and parts of New Hampshire,” Nevins wrote in an email. “If your modem does not automatically re-boot, customers should be able to access the network by re-booting their modem.”
The outage began early Thursday morning, just after midnight, Nevins said in an email.
“We do not have information about the cause or the duration at this juncture in the process,” Nevins wrote.
A storm on Wednesday evening caused power outages across the state.
FairPoint’s phone service is not affected by the broadband outage.
The Vermont Department of Public Service is investigating a FairPoint phone service disruption that lasted nearly 6 hours on Nov. 28. Dispatchers were not able to take emergency calls over that period because the E-911 system was affected by the outage.
FairPoint communications workers have been on strike for nearly two months, and they blame the outages on out-of-state contractors who are unfamiliar with the telecom network.
Glenn Brackett, business manager of IBEW Local 2320 in New Hampshire, said in a statement that outsourcing maintenance and repair of the system will lead to ongoing problems.
“The executives back in North Carolina don’t have to live with the chaos they’ve caused by attacking their skilled workers here in New England,” Brackett said in a statement. “Our 911 systems, our phones and our Internet are failing because their out-of-state contractors can’t do the work.”
