Updated at 3:41 p.m., Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Vandals blacked out Hawaii TVs, company says
Advertiser Staff
Oceanic Time Warner Cable officials believe that would-be copper thieves hacked into a fiber-optic cable Tuesday night in a remote area of Kalihi Valley, temporarily knocking out telecasts of the Allstate Sugar Bowl on all islands.Oceanic officials have asked Honolulu police to investigate.
"There was nothing we could have done," Oceanic spokesman Alan Pollock said yesterday as crews replaced the damaged line. "We're a victim of this."
The single fiber-optic cable was near the Wilson Tunnels, near the site of another Oceanic line that was vandalized three years ago. The line that was cut Tuesday night usually runs overhead but had been knocked down by a tree, Pollock said.
Oceanic engineers are certain that someone cut through 70 of the cable's 144 fibers around 5:15 p.m. and bent the cable open in a 90-degree angle as if someone was peering inside, Pollock said.
"We're not certain it was a copper thief, but our technicians all believe it was because there's no reason to inspect a cable like that," Pollock said. "However, it is important to point out that there is no copper in Oceanic's fiber cables. For all you copper thieves out there: There is no copper in Oceanic's cables."
