Key Peninsula residents posted on social media July 9 that they had lost CenturyLink and Verizon service.
Both companies told The News Tribune that vandalism was the cause. A spokesperson for the Pierce County Sheriff's Department said the agency didn't have any report of that. A spokesperson for the Kitsap County Sheriff's Office said the same.
Lumen ( CenturyLink's parent company) spokesperson Matt Villarreal told The News Tribune via email July 10 that: "some customers in the Gig Harbor, Wash., area experienced service disruptions due to a fiber cut caused by vandalism. All services have now been restored. Our technicians identified the issue and worked hard to fix it as quickly as possible. We know staying connected is important and appreciate our customers' patience and understanding."
Asked for additional details about the vandalism, which agency would be investigating, and how many customers were affected, he wrote July 11: "We've had a few isolated service disruptions affecting a small number of customers in the Gig Harbor and Key Peninsula areas due to ongoing vandalism. We've been in contact with local law enforcement daily, and restoring services is our top priority. We'll provide regular updates and appreciate your patience and understanding."
Villarreal did not respond to The News Tribune's question about how many customers were affected.
Verizon spokesperson Alexis Madrigal told The News Tribune via email July 10 that "a third party vendor was experiencing issues, causing a service interruption for some customers in and around Key Peninsula. Our engineers worked with our vendor partners and this issue was resolved by about 10 p.m." July 9.
Told about Lumen's account, Madrigal wrote July 12: "We can confirm that it was vandalism."
She did not answer The News Tribune's question about how many customers were affected.
Asked for additional information about the vandalism and which agency would be investigating, Madrigal referred The News Tribune to Lumen.
There's been some confusion among residents on social media about whether telecommunications crews working in the area, possibly Comcast, have led to recent outages.
"For questions or concerns about construction work being performed in Key Peninsula, please contact our business partner — Cannon," Comcast spokesperson Andy Colley told The News Tribune via email July 11.
Cannon Companies, a Milton-based utilities contractor, did not respond to The News Tribune's email or voice message July 11.
Asked about any additional information Comcast could share, including how many customers were affected, Colley wrote July 11: "There's really nothing I can tell given our network engineers say that we have not experienced an outage in our existing footprint in Pierce County this week. It may be possible that vandals cut some service provider cables that did not include Comcast, but that is just my speculation. Sorry I can't be of more help."
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