{"id":133483,"date":"2025-09-13T01:03:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T01:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/133483\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T01:03:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T01:03:11","slug":"ellesmere-internet-outage-continues-12-days-after-fire-at-bt-box-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/133483\/","title":{"rendered":"Ellesmere internet outage continues 12 days after fire at BT box"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Charlotte BentonBBC Radio Shropshire and<\/p>\n<p>Eleanor LawsonBBC News, West Midlands<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1757510530_331_grey-placeholder.png\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 iMuqLZ hide-when-no-script\" aria-label=\"image unavailable\"\/><img decoding=\"async\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/42d9fa50-8e68-11f0-9531-afe73c08c2bb.png.webp.webp\" loading=\"eager\" alt=\"BBC A communications box blackened as the result of a fire, with red safety barriers in front of it and red and white fire tape around it. The box is in front of several green bushes.\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 fHZDyi\"\/>BBC<\/p>\n<p>People in Ellesmere have had no internet connection or landlines since a fire at the BT box <\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Residents and businesses have been left without internet and landline for 12 days after a fire at a BT box in Shropshire.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">The communications box, near Ellesmere Marina on Birch Road, caught fire on Friday 29 August, but more than a week later there is still network outage.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">An Openreach spokesperson said: &#8220;One of our cabinets was damaged by fire, disrupting service for customers in the area. Repair work is due to start this weekend, and we&#8217;re doing everything we can to restore service as quickly and safely as possible.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Chloe Halsall, who works for Narrow Boat Hire at the marina, said the internet problems had affected their business.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;Our card machine runs through the internet and all bookings are through the internet,&#8221; Ms Halsall said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;At the moment still can&#8217;t currently see bookings so we have to call the bookings office.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1757510530_331_grey-placeholder.png\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 iMuqLZ hide-when-no-script\" aria-label=\"image unavailable\"\/><img decoding=\"async\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/31d89340-8e6a-11f0-9531-afe73c08c2bb.png.webp.webp\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"A woman with dark hair tied up smiles at the camera while sat in front of a laptop. She wears a dark green polo-shirt with a motif on a boat on it.\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 fHZDyi\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Chloe Halsall, who does administration for Narrow Boat Hire at the marina, said the signal outage had caused problems for the business<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">The 27-year-old said the business had bought a USB adaptor in order to use the 4G internet signal on the manager&#8217;s mobile phone.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;We&#8217;re just relying on hotspots at the moment and the signal, which isn&#8217;t brilliant around here anyway, so it&#8217;s a struggle,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;It drops out every now and again but we&#8217;re getting by and able to use the card machine, which is the most important thing, and gain access to our emails.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;People must feel isolated&#8217;<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">The company&#8217;s phones also run through the wi-fi, so calls have had to be diverted through another line.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Ms Halsall added: &#8220;You do feel cut off from everybody trying to get a hold of you. We&#8217;re very lucky to have 4G on our mobiles, but a lot of people don&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;I imagine it&#8217;s very hard for them they must feel quite isolated at home by themselves not being able to talk to anybody.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">She added it was difficult to contact BT without being a customer and the only contact she had had with the firm was when she reported the issue to them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;It&#8217;s actually quite hard to get a hold of them and talk to them,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Charlotte BentonBBC Radio Shropshire and Eleanor LawsonBBC News, West Midlands BBC People in Ellesmere have had no internet&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[1638,86,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-133483","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-internet","8":"tag-internet","9":"tag-technology","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}