As BNS indicated, Tele2’s public relations manager Asta Buitkutė said that on Saturday during the storm, 366 communication towers were without electricity, and after restoring a quarter on Sunday, about 150 remained on Monday.
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“Maximum technical maintenance capacities are concentrated and they are still being increased. We are transporting electric generators, also recharging station batteries, cooperating with services to restore electricity supply first on priority lines,” A. Buitkutė told BNS in a comment.
According to Tele2’s technical director for the Baltic countries, Valerijus Kovzanas, the most difficult situation remains in more forested and remote areas where the electricity network is sparser and fault repair takes longer.
In turn, Modestas Ropė, director of next-generation networks at Bite Lietuva, told BNS that 330 Bite towers experienced power supply disruptions, currently about 170 remain – which accounts for about 10% of the entire Bite communication network.
According to him, the most affected are Anykščiai district, Rokiškis, Jonava, Šakiai, Kėdainiai, where customers may have difficulties making calls and using internet data: “Most of Bite’s engineers are working in Eastern Lithuania, where our largest forces are concentrated, and all our specialists have been recalled from vacation.”
According to M. Ropė, no Bite communication tower was damaged during the storm, but strong winds “twist” communication equipment, so after restoring electricity supply, disruptions will need to be fixed.
Meanwhile, Telia’s digital transformation and technology manager Vygintas Domarkas said that about 350 base stations, or about 20% of the entire network, were not working in the first half of Sunday. Meanwhile, on Monday morning, 200 base stations, or about a tenth of the network, were not working.
“The storm did not cause direct damage to our network or technological objects. All the impact on communication services is related to power supply disruptions,” V. Domarkas told BNS in a comment.
He could not say when the operation of all affected stations will be fully restored, as this directly depends on the restoration of power supply work.
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“In areas where electricity supply is still not restored and where backup batteries have run out or generators have not yet been connected, customers may experience disruptions in mobile communication, mobile internet, and fixed communication services. Currently, about 10% of the mobile network and about 4% of the fixed network infrastructure are not working,” said a Telia representative.
“The storm brings down trees on power lines, and when the power supply is disrupted, after some time the communication also fails (…). Without electricity, our towers operate from a few to 12 hours, but with power outages as long as now, no batteries will help. Finally, even if communication works, people’s devices will run out of battery, so restoring power supply is critically important,” Bite’s representative M. Ropė told BNS in a comment.
In turn, the state-owned Lithuanian Radio and Television Center (Telecentras) reports that its data centers and broadcasting networks operated stably last Saturday, with only one of them recording a voltage drop.
“Saturday’s storm did not have a noticeable impact on Telecentras-managed infrastructure due to autonomous power supply systems installed at our facilities. Their main purpose is to ensure the transmission of television and radio programs created by broadcasters – primarily the National Broadcaster LRT – for up to 72 hours, which was accomplished,” said the company’s director Remigijus Šeris in a statement.
Residents experiencing communication disruptions are advised to restart their home internet router, phone, or briefly turn on and off airplane mode – this way the device reconnects to the network available at that time. If the power supply in the area is not yet restored, it is important to save phone battery and, if possible, provide an external power source.
Due to the storm that raged in Lithuania on Saturday, about 108.6 thousand users still do not have electricity after noon on Monday.
According to the Energy Distribution Operator (ESO), the maximum number of disruptions was recorded on Saturday evening, when 268 thousand users were without electricity.
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