Cape 911 service is cut again by accident

What began as an "oops" turned into an "oh, not again."

Telephone service was interrupted around 9 a.m. Wednesday when employees of Lappe Cement Finishing Inc. of Perryville, working on Independence Street between Sprigg and Ellis streets, cut a cable that provided telephone service to the city's main fire station. Another unkind cut by a construction crew silenced phone lines at the Cape Girardeau Police Department and city hall last week.

To handle the firefighters' emergencies, 911 service was rerouted to the Cape Girardeau County Sheriff's Department, said assistant fire chief Mark Hasheider.

"It was a fairly seamless transfer where a caller would not notice any difference," Hasheider said.

Service to the 911 lines was restored after about two hours, he said. Service to the administration line came back on around 4 p.m. In the meantime, the calls were rerouted to the city manager's office. Employees there relayed calls to firefighters' cell phone numbers.

Last week's break in phone service involved a cable about 50 feet from where Wednesday's incident occurred. Police 911 calls were routed to the sheriff's department, and the fire department took the police department's administrative calls and relayed them using cell phones.

Rusty Lappe, the project supervisor, said his company called "Dig Rite," a statewide service the telephone company and other utilities work with to assist people doing excavating. The utilities cooperate by coming to work sites and marking spots where cable is buried.

Lappe said his firm always calls "Dig Rite."

"It was mismarked cable, from what I had seen," said Lappe, explaining the most recent mishap. "The marks were beyond where the cable was."

Had the cable been buried deeper, it would have been no problem, Lappe said. But the cable that was cut in both instances was only about six inches under the pavement.

Ann Balsamo, public relations officer with SBC in St. Louis, said that SBC, the city and the contractor met Wednesday to make sure the problem doesn't happen again.

"There's a lot of construction going on in Cape Girardeau, and that's progress," she said. "We are trying to work closely with the city and the contractor to make sure it doesn't happen, or that it happens with as little disruption as possible."

Lappe said accidents like this do happen occasionally.

"When you get in an old part of town where the utilities have been there for years, it's one of the hazards," he said.

City employees are hoping it won't happen again.

"They still have to go up the alleyway yet," Hasheider said. "I have my fingers crossed."

lredeffer@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 160