Gippsland storms wipe out phone coverage for four days with no triple-zero service

Many vulnerable Gippsland communities have lost power and phone coverage for four days, with some still waiting to be reconnected.

Dairy farmer Kelvin Trotman from Won Wron was left without phone service after the storms. Picture: Yuri Kouzmin

Four days of mobile phone and landline exchange outages, in the wake of the Gippsland floods, has left farmers isolated and unable to even make triple-0 calls, raising fears of what would happen if a major disaster swept the state.

Phone coverage crashed across Gippsland last Thursday morning, after wild weather swept into the region on Wednesday, cutting power to 200,000 homes and businesses.

Telstra’s mobile towers’ backup batteries went flat within 12 hours of the power going down, with Won Wron farmers, near Yarram, reporting the had lost coverage by 9am Thursday.

Won Wron farmer Kelvin Trotman faced a particularly tough time, given his underlying health problems mean he needs access to triple-0.

“I’m in my 70s and have kidney problems and diabetes,” Mr Trotman said. “It was a killer, especially when my family was trying to get in touch with me. We even lost ABC (FM) radio.”

It took until Monday for phone services to be restored.

United Dairyfarmers of Victoria president Paul Mumford said he would push the Victorian Farmers Federation to pursue the issue of maintaining telecommunications during a natural disaster.

Telstra would not release details of how many towers and landline exchanges ran out of power during last week’s storms, but a spokesman said teams had set up generators to restore power to 50 priority sites across eastern Victoria by late Friday.

Another 40 communities, who had been left without mobile phone coverage or access to triple-0 landline services since Thursday, regained coverage over the weekend.

“We know there’s more work to do, which is why we’re prioritising restoration efforts to bring connectivity back to isolated communities and working to ensure critical network sites that serve big areas or large populations remain up and running,” a Telstra spokesman said.

“The main issue we’re facing is the loss of mains power to our sites, so we’re working closely with power authorities and our power and facilities teams are on the ground to prioritise the restoration of key sites where we can do so safely.

“Fallen trees are preventing road access to some of our sites and we need to wait for the path to be cleared before we can restore these services.”

An Optus spokesman said “mobile towers do have back-up battery power however, when there are extended power outages network infrastructure is affected, so we have been working to deploy generators where towers are accessible.

“We appreciate that local communities are reliant on mobile reception but restoration of power is critical in restoring connectivity where battery resources are depleted.”

A Vodafone spokesman said the telco deployed generators and battery cells on wheels where possible, during prolonged outages.

AusNet had reconnected to most customers’ power by Monday afternoon, with a spokesman saying it hoped the remaining 24,000, spread from the Dandenong Ranges to South Gippsland and Sale, would be connected by the end of the week.

The power disruptions caused enormous stress to dairy farmers across Gippsland, with many missing milkings, which put cows under stress and put milk quality at risk.

“We’re all just mentally exhausted,” Mr Mumford said, who set up a PTO-driven generator to run his rotary dairy, which was also used to milk neighbours’ cows.