Copper stolen from fibre optic cables in rural Kingston, Ont.
Global News
For the second time in a month, some rural Kingston, Ont., residents were without internet as a thief cut a fibre optic cable to steal copper.
It was another day of lost business for Josh Anderson when his internet service was suddenly interrupted due to an intentionally cut fiber-optic cable.
“I woke up early this morning, had alerts that the internet was down at our small business and, lo and behold, the fibre was down again,” said Anderson.
Kingston Police were called to the area of 2185 Perth Road, north of Kingston, Tuesday morning to investigate theft of a section of Bell fibre optic line.
The cables, much like catalytic converters, have precious metals in them: copper.
Overnight Monday into Tuesday it appears that someone cut down the Perth Road Cables and made off with the copper, much to the chagrin of people like Anderson.
“For businesses out here, it’s crippling. I mean, fibre’s a great service until somebody does this,” added Anderson.
Kingston city councillor Gary Oosterhof, who represents the affected area, said his first concern was peoples’ safety.
“People have certainly seen what’s happening and it’s pretty devastating. I can imagine it’s not going to be easy to fix, so we certainly hope that this doesn’t happen again,” he said.