Cape Town – The Western Cape passenger rail service is currently being disrupted by a telecommunications outage, says spokesperson Nana Zenani.
’’The cause of the outage is a vandalised optic fibre cable on the Deep River line. The cut optic fibre has absolutely no copper inside, however, it keeps being vandalised,’’ Zenani said on Wednesday.
’’The result is that trains in various corridors across the region cannot be automatically controlled at the Train Control Centre.
’’When the automated panel goes off, the team cannot automatically see where the trains are to effectively and safely move them.
’’The safety protocol when this happens is to manually authorise each train movement for safety. This creates additional travel time which would otherwise be managed automatically by trail control.
’’Commuters are advised to make use of alternative transport solutions in the interim until the fibre is repaired by our technicians. Metrorail will continue to update commuters of any further developments.’’
IOL