Is West Coast SI, part of NZ ??

Forums › 2degrees (including Slingshot, Orcon, Flip, Stuff Fibre, MyRepublic, 2talk and Vocus) › Is West Coast SI, part of NZ ??

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Geek @ Coastguard NZ
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#2627022 26-Dec-2020 20:58

Graymond:

Graymond:

I have a friend residing in Hokatika who lost broadband and Cell phone yesterday (Xmas Day) for a number of hours, he had tried to find out why, with no luck, however through his other communication sources he heard that a Farmer ? had dug up a fibre cable and there was a two hour wait for technicians to arrive from Christchurch.

The query is, why was this not mentioned on 2degrees fault page,

and why was the news media so quite, if it had been a larger population area it would have made Headlines.

There was another service Provider involved which showed no problems.

Due to the responses that have been posted, I am resubmitting the query so that you all do not loose track, and not go of course with your replies.

Were 2degrees not notified of this fault, if they were why was it not posted ?

See https://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=85&topicid=280585&page_no=1#2626824

Gavin / xpd / FastRaccoon / Geek of Coastguard New Zealand

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Graymond

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#2627023 26-Dec-2020 21:02

quickymart:

My disclosure: I was born and raised on the Coast for the first 17 years of my life as well, and I know that the area in question is quite sparsely populated. It's also very rugged, rough (not to mention isolated) terrain - it's definitely not smooth rolling plains or anything like Canterbury, for example. Cable repairs (as Mr Biddle and John correctly state) can take a LONG time to get done, it's never as simple as "let's just rejoin the cable where the cut happened, and we're all good".

Having said that, Chorus are currently in the process of building a fibre line from south of the glaciers running through to Wanaka (from memory) - this will give the Coast some redundancy if something like this happens again.

The major problem is that a Government sold off Telecom, time, costs, are now Profit driven, good grief look at some of the Chorus Sub Contractors with their 'Weetbix' qualifications.

quickymart

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#2627036 26-Dec-2020 22:02

So you think if Telecom were still the only game in town, every fibre install would be 100% perfect and done within a week - and still be free? I think that's the point you're trying to make but I could (most likely) be entirely wrong on that one.

Sorry but I beg to differ - and to reiterate my last point - a second fibre cable linking the southern part of the Coast (with all of about 4 000 people but covering over 250kms) is currently being constructed, to reduce a future occurrence of this sort of thing. Note that this is due to a contribution from the government, as otherwise it wouldn't be able to be built at all due to cost (as John says above):

https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/southland/fibre-upgrade-southland-west-coast

Graymond

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#2627045 26-Dec-2020 22:25

quickymart:

So you think if Telecom were still the only game in town, every fibre install would be 100% perfect and done within a week - and still be free? I think that's the point you're trying to make but I could (most likely) be entirely wrong on that one.

Sorry but I beg to differ - and to reiterate my last point - a second fibre cable linking the southern part of the Coast (with all of about 4 000 people but covering over 250kms) is currently being constructed, to reduce a future occurrence of this sort of thing. Note that this is due to a contribution from the government, as otherwise it wouldn't be able to be built at all due to cost (as John says above):

https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/southland/fibre-upgrade-southland-west-coast

Yes, I know what you wrote, but like others you have deviated from the original query.

Yes, you are entirely incorrect about what I was thinking, however, most likely if the millions of $'s not been spent on the so called beneficial change to Private profit driven corporations we could by now had a very up to date communication system that was not based on population numbers, but based on New Zealand....... just a thought..

richms

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#2627047 26-Dec-2020 22:37

I guess there are not enough customers in the area to make it worth making more redundant connections. Ultimately its up to the end use to have multiple options for communications. Its a bit hard when they all go out on the same fiber from a remote isolated community but thats the downside of living remotely.

There are non network based communication methods like CB, or you can get a satellite service that will give you some redundancy in communications if needed.

If telecom was still govt operated, the only game in town and running like they did in the old days we would probably still have copper ADSL service with a 400 or 600 meg monthly cap on it, so be careful what you tout as being a good option.

Richard rich.ms

Graymond

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#2627056 26-Dec-2020 23:56

richms:

If telecom was still govt operated, the only game in town and running like they did in the old days we would probably still have copper ADSL service with a 400 or 600 meg monthly cap on it, so be careful what you tout as being a good option.

For goodness sake, what is it with these type of replies, do you really think that the above comment that you made is valid, times and technology change as would the old Telecom.

Essential services should not be in the hands of profit driven private enterprise.

I am a bit disgusted that a simple query has brought all these off subject comments, excuses being made by those involve in communications.

Apart from my past employment, Communications and technology are a hobby of mine so I am aware of what can and cannot be done.

I gather from the 'Reps' that it is okay to have an essential communication failure with no backup, and not notify any one.

Should the comment be in your mind, 'if the systems out, how do we communicate', the same way as the Police and other essential services do, Radio being one way..

michaelmurfy

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#2627061 27-Dec-2020 01:40

Graymond:

Essential services should not be in the hands of profit driven private enterprise.

I think how NZ does it is actually very good - telecommunication providers all have equal and regulated access to these networks and the networks themselves are actually maintained pretty well all things considering. How do you actually propose this changes? Outages happen regardless and we've got it very good here in New Zealand compared for example Australia, Canada or the US.

I am a bit disgusted that a simple query has brought all these off subject comments, excuses being made by those involve in communications.

Actually most of the replies are on-topic. Just because somebody doesn't agree with you doesn't make it an excuse. There are many here posting who for starters live on the west coast and were affected by this outage and who are industry experts in the subject.

I'm going to add one - given this fibre cut knocked out everything (Mobiles, Landlines and Internet) then what difference would it make 2degrees posting to their status page would make if you're unable to check it in the first place? If you're lucky enough to have a BGAN or some form of alternative communications then Chorus do post such outages on their own site: https://www.chorus.co.nz/outages

But profit driven or not - these sorts of outages do happen in all industries and at-least there is another backup fibre being built. Fibre is expensive and without investment it simply won't happen. Just be thankful you don't have VDSL "masked" as Fibre like many do in the UK or Australia and that significant investment has been put in to improve the majority of New Zealanders access.

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sbiddle

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#2627068 27-Dec-2020 06:35

Graymond:

Perhaps you can explain to us why there is not a loop back at the main West Coast fibre termination whereby a fault on the incoming feed can be isolated and the Coast run as a stand alone system,perhaps to technical...

There is redundancy to Hokitika, and as already mentioned several times there is redundancy being constructed further south at huge cost for fibre expansion to areas that don't currently have good outside connectivy, and also to improve reduncancy.

BUT this will not, and can never mean that redundancy will exist in every part of the network. That is simply impossible. Redundancy doesn't exist in every part of telco networks now because it's simply not cost effective to build that in. The recent fibre outage in South Auckland that took out services for several days is a classic example.

Even after millions are spent on the new fibre between Fox Glacier and Lake Haawea (which will bring a lot of new connectivity to the area) it will still have single points of failure, and the real world reality that not every carrier that buys capacity on a route will buy protected capacity because of a) the complexity of introducing this into a network and b) the cost.

Even with an unlimited budget spade fade could and still will take out services, and there is absolutely zero guarantee that somebody with a digger can't take out services even if there were multiple new fibre crossings between the South Island West coast and East coast.

I don't understand your comment about "stand alone systems". That is simply not possible in a modern IP based world if your packets can't go anywhere.

sbiddle

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#2627069 27-Dec-2020 06:42

Graymond:

quickymart:

My disclosure: I was born and raised on the Coast for the first 17 years of my life as well, and I know that the area in question is quite sparsely populated. It's also very rugged, rough (not to mention isolated) terrain - it's definitely not smooth rolling plains or anything like Canterbury, for example. Cable repairs (as Mr Biddle and John correctly state) can take a LONG time to get done, it's never as simple as "let's just rejoin the cable where the cut happened, and we're all good".

Having said that, Chorus are currently in the process of building a fibre line from south of the glaciers running through to Wanaka (from memory) - this will give the Coast some redundancy if something like this happens again.

The major problem is that a Government sold off Telecom, time, costs, are now Profit driven, good grief look at some of the Chorus Sub Contractors with their 'Weetbix' qualifications.

Do you forget the days when Telecom was Government owned and it took weeks just to get a simple phone line connected even if cabling was intact?

It's pretty easy to argue that privatisation, not Govt ownership, has delivered us the great telco infrastructure network that we have today. You only need to look at Australia of proof of what happens when the Govt couldn't quite fully distance itself from it's legacy state owned telco (Telstra). Their NBN network is now complete and is a joke, all because the Govt at the time and the politics surrounding the network and Telstra ownership.

Compare that to NZ where we have arguably the best open access telco network in the world with UFB because govt backed private companies were allowed to proceed with their own networks.

quickymart

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#2627075 27-Dec-2020 07:22

I have just realised that Graymond has actually had something along these lines explained to him previously:

https://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumId=85&topicId=248993

Note Graymond - while I feel for your friend's situation, if they want a guaranteed, 100% uptime with their connection, they will be paying a premium per month for such a service. My guess is they don't, so they will be getting what the majority of households will be getting, which is best effort; no connection is guaranteed. If your friend wants a higher level of service, so be it - but they will be paying much more than $80 a month (or whatever they pay) for it now.

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#2627076 27-Dec-2020 07:30

Looks like someone waits for an outage so they can complain on Geekzone!

nztim

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#2627080 27-Dec-2020 08:02

sbiddle:

Do you forget the days when Telecom was Government owned and it took weeks just to get a simple phone line connected even if cabling was intact?

Think this was the days of cross bar when disconnecting/connecting subs was jumpering/unjumpering the MDF

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tdgeek

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#2627082 27-Dec-2020 08:15

Graymond:

Essential services should not be in the hands of profit driven private enterprise.

Electricity is an essential service, as is fuel. Would it be better if West Coast internet was run by the Government at break even? I suspect it would be as it would have redundancy everywhere, but i'd hate to read your monthly bill

GGJohnstone

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#2627093 27-Dec-2020 09:13

NO!

Now the trees,gold,and cheap coal are done. Westland is a great Conservation Conscience for the whole country. SNA's whitebait reserves. A source of entertainment and amusement in t.v. weather. The accuracy of such is the biggest laugh.

The objective of a self healing ring around the South Island with fiber is a truly noble one that we could expect to happen in a less profit driven industry.

IN the meanwhile we still have Ham radio without help from officialdom regarding optimum frequency use but plenty of onerous regulation and rules. A radio scanner can give more information than facebook sometimes.

A8 might clear this up for a while after the alpine passes close. Media and J.A. can fly over in helicopters wringing their hands looking at a new pest free area after all the people have to leave.

RunningMan

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#2627100 27-Dec-2020 09:30

Graymond: [snip] Yes, I know what you wrote, but like others you have deviated from the original query.

Righto, back on topic.

Graymond: Is West Coast SI, part of NZ ??

Yes, it is. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Coast,_New_Zealand

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