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Published October 11, 2013
Contingency plans in focus after SingTel fire
IDA to conduct 'thorough study' of incident, even as telco
sorts through the mess
By
Joyce
Hooi [email][email protected][/email]
print |email this article
<!-- end of header //-->
SingTel's engineers spent the day piecing together fibre optic strands
by hand amid charred post-fire debris at the telco's Bukit Panjang facility
yesterday - PHOTO:
SINGTEL
<!-- /.view -->
<!-- /.view -->
<!-- end of media lightbox //-->
[SINGAPORE] SingTel's engineers spent the day piecing together fibre optic
strands by hand amid charred post-fire debris at the telco's Bukit Panjang
facility yesterday.
Finding the cause of Wednesday's fire and the subsequent service disruptions,
however, will preoccupy the firm during the coming weeks.
The fire, which had disrupted services for consumers and businesses over the
past two days, had burnt 149 fibre optic cables in a chamber at the telco's
Bukit Panjang exchange, 81 of which were OpenNet's. The other two chambers in
the building were not affected.
Fibre cable repairs for corporate customers were completed last night, while
the remaining services were on track for restoration by 7am today.
There is no preliminary estimate for the financial fallout of the fire or the
service disruption, SingTel's CEO Consumer Singapore, Yuen Kuan Moon, told the
media in a briefing at ComCentre yesterday.
In response to questions about what could have caused the fire and what role,
if any, the facility's fire suppression system had played, Mr Yuen said, "We are
currently investigating. Our priority is to first ensure that service is being
restored."
In the coming weeks, the questions will begin in earnest. Within the telco,
an inquiry will be convened to determine the cause of the fire and how its
distribution network can be reinforced, Mr Yuen said.
SingTel also defended its business continuity plans yesterday, saying that it
has physical location diversity - the Bukit Panjang building is one of nine such
locations in Singapore - and electronic diversity, in which some switches are
replicated.
"Unfortunately, in the case of the Bukit Panjang office, the damage caused by
the fire is physical," the telco said.
=> Talking cock...If there is real redundancy, this won't have happened. Cut corner + 0 redundancy.
The restoration task was made harder because the colour codes used to
differentiate one kind of cable from another had been razed off by the fire.
Engineers had to either divert cables to an undamaged chamber or cut out burnt
portions and splice together the undamaged fibres - each thinner than a human
hair - by hand.
Each cable can carry 96, 192 or 288 fibre strands, each strand supporting up
to 16 corporate customers or 24 residential ones.
SingTel will not be the only entity asking hard questions of itself. The
industry regulator, the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), will
carry out a "thorough study" of the incident, said Minister for Communications
and Information Yaacob Ibrahim yesterday. "We have to wait for the police report
. . . and then we will start our investigation," he said, speaking at SingTel's
Bukit Panjang building yesterday.
=> Why must wait for police report before working?
An IDA investigation has the potential to result in mammoth fines. Just last
week, M1 was fined a history-making $1.5 million for the outage of its 2G and 3G
mobile phone services in January.
Dr Yaacob called what happened on Wednesday a "major incident that we are
concerned about". Telephone exchanges are considered critical pieces of
infrastructure, he noted.
Other quarters, too, will look askance at SingTel. DBS, which saw some of its
branches and ATMs affected on Wednesday, told The Business Times that it has a
"diverse network contingency plan that ensures minimal disruption to our
businesses in the event of an incident such as the fire at SingTel's Bukit
Panjang exchange".
DBS is "working with SingTel to understand why the network contingency plan
was not effective for the small proportion of DBS/POSB branches that were
impacted," the bank's spokeswoman added.
=> Why there was no audit that the so-called backup plan was indeed working? All are sleeping cos they are monopolies/oligopolies with a captive market. SGs can only suck thumbs if they decide to close shop!
Two of UOB's branches and 11 of OCBC's ATMs were also affected by SingTel's
fire on Wednesday. All three banks saw services resume either that night itself
or early yesterday morning before the start of business.
"Our branches were not impacted as our network was designed to be able to be
supported by a secondary exchange if the primary one fails," an OCBC spokesman
said.
BT understands that a bank's ATM might be able to shrug off a service
disruption if it has a backup network line, as long as both the main and backup
line are not connected to the same exchange.
Yesterday, Dr Yaacob said the IDA had always been concerned about the need
for backup systems, even before the SingTel fire happened. "We've been looking
at it closely. Every incident will be a learning point for us . . . clearly,
there are things (that) we will begin to learn because the systems are becoming
very complex," he said.
=> And these are the same FAP Traitors who assert that SGs are too expensive and hence deserve to be replaced by FTrash while being overpaid SLEEPING APPRENTICES themselves. 60%, song bo?
By yesterday, the collateral damage from the fire appeared to have been
contained. By 6pm, OpenNet had restored service to 25 per cent of M1's 1,000
affected fibre broadband customers.
=> Only 25% up and the 154th can clap hands! Nice work!
StarHub, which leases optical fibre capacity from SingTel, said that cable
TV, cable broadband and digital voice services for affected customers were fully
restored yesterday afternoon, while 36 per cent of its fibre broadband services
had been restored by yesterday evening.
Contingency plans in focus after SingTel fire
IDA to conduct 'thorough study' of incident, even as telco
sorts through the mess
By
Joyce
Hooi [email][email protected][/email]
print |email this article
<!-- end of header //-->
SingTel's engineers spent the day piecing together fibre optic strands
by hand amid charred post-fire debris at the telco's Bukit Panjang facility
yesterday - PHOTO:
SINGTEL
<!-- /.view -->
<!-- /.view -->
<!-- end of media lightbox //-->
[SINGAPORE] SingTel's engineers spent the day piecing together fibre optic
strands by hand amid charred post-fire debris at the telco's Bukit Panjang
facility yesterday.
Finding the cause of Wednesday's fire and the subsequent service disruptions,
however, will preoccupy the firm during the coming weeks.
The fire, which had disrupted services for consumers and businesses over the
past two days, had burnt 149 fibre optic cables in a chamber at the telco's
Bukit Panjang exchange, 81 of which were OpenNet's. The other two chambers in
the building were not affected.
Fibre cable repairs for corporate customers were completed last night, while
the remaining services were on track for restoration by 7am today.
There is no preliminary estimate for the financial fallout of the fire or the
service disruption, SingTel's CEO Consumer Singapore, Yuen Kuan Moon, told the
media in a briefing at ComCentre yesterday.
In response to questions about what could have caused the fire and what role,
if any, the facility's fire suppression system had played, Mr Yuen said, "We are
currently investigating. Our priority is to first ensure that service is being
restored."
In the coming weeks, the questions will begin in earnest. Within the telco,
an inquiry will be convened to determine the cause of the fire and how its
distribution network can be reinforced, Mr Yuen said.
SingTel also defended its business continuity plans yesterday, saying that it
has physical location diversity - the Bukit Panjang building is one of nine such
locations in Singapore - and electronic diversity, in which some switches are
replicated.
"Unfortunately, in the case of the Bukit Panjang office, the damage caused by
the fire is physical," the telco said.
=> Talking cock...If there is real redundancy, this won't have happened. Cut corner + 0 redundancy.
The restoration task was made harder because the colour codes used to
differentiate one kind of cable from another had been razed off by the fire.
Engineers had to either divert cables to an undamaged chamber or cut out burnt
portions and splice together the undamaged fibres - each thinner than a human
hair - by hand.
Each cable can carry 96, 192 or 288 fibre strands, each strand supporting up
to 16 corporate customers or 24 residential ones.
SingTel will not be the only entity asking hard questions of itself. The
industry regulator, the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), will
carry out a "thorough study" of the incident, said Minister for Communications
and Information Yaacob Ibrahim yesterday. "We have to wait for the police report
. . . and then we will start our investigation," he said, speaking at SingTel's
Bukit Panjang building yesterday.
=> Why must wait for police report before working?
An IDA investigation has the potential to result in mammoth fines. Just last
week, M1 was fined a history-making $1.5 million for the outage of its 2G and 3G
mobile phone services in January.
Dr Yaacob called what happened on Wednesday a "major incident that we are
concerned about". Telephone exchanges are considered critical pieces of
infrastructure, he noted.
Other quarters, too, will look askance at SingTel. DBS, which saw some of its
branches and ATMs affected on Wednesday, told The Business Times that it has a
"diverse network contingency plan that ensures minimal disruption to our
businesses in the event of an incident such as the fire at SingTel's Bukit
Panjang exchange".
DBS is "working with SingTel to understand why the network contingency plan
was not effective for the small proportion of DBS/POSB branches that were
impacted," the bank's spokeswoman added.
=> Why there was no audit that the so-called backup plan was indeed working? All are sleeping cos they are monopolies/oligopolies with a captive market. SGs can only suck thumbs if they decide to close shop!
Two of UOB's branches and 11 of OCBC's ATMs were also affected by SingTel's
fire on Wednesday. All three banks saw services resume either that night itself
or early yesterday morning before the start of business.
"Our branches were not impacted as our network was designed to be able to be
supported by a secondary exchange if the primary one fails," an OCBC spokesman
said.
BT understands that a bank's ATM might be able to shrug off a service
disruption if it has a backup network line, as long as both the main and backup
line are not connected to the same exchange.
Yesterday, Dr Yaacob said the IDA had always been concerned about the need
for backup systems, even before the SingTel fire happened. "We've been looking
at it closely. Every incident will be a learning point for us . . . clearly,
there are things (that) we will begin to learn because the systems are becoming
very complex," he said.
=> And these are the same FAP Traitors who assert that SGs are too expensive and hence deserve to be replaced by FTrash while being overpaid SLEEPING APPRENTICES themselves. 60%, song bo?
By yesterday, the collateral damage from the fire appeared to have been
contained. By 6pm, OpenNet had restored service to 25 per cent of M1's 1,000
affected fibre broadband customers.
=> Only 25% up and the 154th can clap hands! Nice work!
StarHub, which leases optical fibre capacity from SingTel, said that cable
TV, cable broadband and digital voice services for affected customers were fully
restored yesterday afternoon, while 36 per cent of its fibre broadband services
had been restored by yesterday evening.
How about LHY's mistress
