It has been a tough Monday for many in Pakistan with major mobile and landline networks going down. According to reports, services of Ufone and PTCL were disrupted after fiber optic damage. This lead to millions of Pakistanis facing difficulty in connecting with their loved ones or not-so-loved ones.
As the services collapsed, there were hundreds of people complaining about it. Many PTCL users were complaining about being unable to connect to the internet while some also reported about issues with their landline numbers. Ufone services also suffered, with a major loss of connectivity in various parts of the country. It thus made it impossible for its customers to send or receive calls and messages or connect to the internet.
Dawn news has reported that the disruption has arisen after a major underground fiber-optic cable was severed. The outage has affected at least four areas of Karachi and Balochistan while some parts of Punjab were also facing difficulty connecting. It was also reported that Pakistan railways e-ticketing system has stopped working because of the outage.
No official source from PTCL or Ufone has confirmed the reason for the outage, however, PTCL has said that it is working on the matter and teams are on the ground trying to resolve the issue. You can read their official statement below.
We are currently facing major outage on our network due to which internet service to some of our customers is impacted. #PTCL
(1 of 2)— PTCL (@PTCLOfficial) December 26, 2016
Our teams are working on-ground to restore the service as soon as possible. We sincerely regret the inconvenience caused. #PTCL
(2 of 2)— PTCL (@PTCLOfficial) December 26, 2016
The Reaction
Thousands of Pakistanis took to social media to express their frustration because of the outage. Thus that ended up making the hashtag #PTCL trend on Twitter. From trying to chip in their words of wisdom as they guess the reasons for the outage to anger outbreaks to poking fun – there were variety of reactions coming from the ever enjoying PakTweeps (Pakistani Tweeps).
#PTCL Land-line and cellular services in different parts of country disrupted after a major fibre optic cable was severed ??
— ?️abloo (@Manum_Babloo) December 26, 2016
Pakistan Ke Mukhtalif Shehron Main Fiber Optic Main Technical Fault Ke Bais PTCL Or Ufone Ki Services Mutasir, Bahali Ka Kaam Jari
— Raheel Rashid (@KhiOfficial) December 26, 2016
Aysa lag raha ha k mae Mars pr aa gaya ho.
No Internet. #ptcl down.— محمد طلحہ ??? (@mtm_talha) December 26, 2016
Due to PTCL's fiber optic cut, currently Ufone's services are disrupted…
— Gk Laghari (@GkLeghari) December 26, 2016
Due to PTCL's fiber optic cut, currently Ufone's services are disrupted…
— Gk Laghari (@GkLeghari) December 26, 2016
#OverHeard: Her: Ufone ka network nahi chalrha na?
Him: Nahi.
Her: Suna hai zong/telenor ke ilawaa sab networks ki wires toot gayi hain!— fahhad rajper ⚡️ (@FahhadRajper) December 26, 2016
Reports are coming in of services being restored in different parts of the country after the outage that lasted several hours. Are the services working in your area? Tell us below.
