On Thursday July 21st at 4PM, a microburst hit Frye Island causing widespread major damage to multiple homes across the island and trees down everywhere on utility lines. Sebago Fiber had finished network construction just a few weeks before.
A large tree demolished 600 feet of utilities to the ground, power poles, transformers and both communications companies. When we designed Sebago Fiber network, we used this specific tree as our hypothetical worst case scenario in designing our fiber network, but the design worked and our fiber survived and everyone stayed online.
Pine tree demolished power and communications.
Power was out for 36 hours on the island. Sebago Fiber continued operations without interruptions. Our support staff answered emails and phone calls while staffing traffic control at areas with downed communications wires. Our backup power system and redundancies worked to keep the network online. Our customers had four additional hours of connectivity with the battery backup UPS units in their homes and customers with generators stayed online the entire time. Town and Ferry connectivity continued uninterrupted on town generators.
Sebago Fiber staff worked with CMP for 40 hours straight. After two shifts CMP contractors had cleared trees, set new poles and attempted to set anchors. CMP informed us they had to move on to the mainland and leave communications wires on the ground and roads closed. Sebago Fiber, with CMP’s permission, brought in our own contractor crew with a digger-derrick, ledge rig and bucket truck to continue repairs. Our on call contractors were on site within an hour. We replaced anchors and guying for CMP and then restored Sebago Fiber’s and Consolidated Communication’s plant for those 600 feet by Friday at 11PM. The next day Saturday, we restored all five Sebago Fiber customers who had lost drops to their home with mutual aid from our friends at CribStone Communications. Our competitors were restoring DSL customers into the following week.
Pole and transformer demolished by pine tree. Sebago Fiber and Consolidated Communications cables are pinned to the ground.
If you want fast reliable internet service, from a company who responds to the needs on the island, Sebago Fiber is here. We have our own bucket truck, two contractors on call and mutual aid agreements with other small Maine FTTH ISPs so we can make repairs faster than the competitors.
Please remember to sign-up by October 20th if you want fast reliable fiber at your home in 2023.
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