Accident cuts phone service downtown

BY MICHAEL BOSTIAN
SALISBURY POST

The trench holding a large batch of telephone lines behind Bernhardt’s Hardware on Main Street is only a few yards long.

But a construction crew’s misstep Wednesday reached a lot further.

The crew severed phone service to several businesses, costing them money and causing them headaches.

Eva Bingham, daughter of Bernhardt’s Hardware owner Paul Bernhardt, said their phone and charge-card services went out around 9 a.m. and were not available until late Wednesday. During her initial call to BellSouth, Bingham was told there was no trouble with the lines. During subsequent calls, however, she was told that someone would be out shortly to inspect and repair the damage.

The mishap occurred at the end of Hogan’s Alley where a law office is being constructed on Lee Street. The alley runs between Bernhardt’s and Textile Products Inc. Daryl Dukelow owns the building in front of the construction site and told Paul Bernhardt that “they chopped through a whole big wad of telephone wires” when he inspected the damage himself.

BellSouth’s Area Director Erik Lindborg confirmed that a construction crew cut a “major cable.” The company notified the city manager’s office as soon as BellSouth learned of the problem, Lindborg said.

Across Main Street at the corner of West Innes Street, Travel Associates of Salisbury Inc. reported no problems.

Bingham said her father’s business is fairly old-fashioned and doesn’t rely heavily on phone business.

Frank’s Pawn Shop suffered far worse.

Frank Broadway, of Frank’s Pawn Shop, said he was unhappy about the service he received from the phone company.

“I understand it was an accident, but I think it was careless,” Broadway said. “We could not get an urgent response from BellSouth.”

Broadway said they had to turn away many customers, most of whom wanted to pay bills or transfer money via Western Union. Because the majority of their transactions are electronic, they were also unable to pay out any money. As of this morning, Broadway couldn’t estimate how much business the phone outage cost him.

The most frustrating part, Broadway said, was that BellSouth could not get a repair crew to the site. Broadway and Bingham said David Shelby, a local attorney who will move into the new building, came by to explain what had happened and calm everyone down.

“He was so nice to everyone and was a peacemaker,” Bingham said.

But once the damage was done, Broadway said the private contractor doing the work packed up and left — and it was hours before anyone showed up to fix it.

“Nobody could get anything done,”Broadway said. “Southern Bell should really try to do a better job of servicing their customers.”

BellSouth’s Lindborg said that as soon as the company learned of the outage, it initiated an emergency recovery procedure but had to call in construction crews to move more concrete to get to the break. So the repair work took longer than expected.

After making several unsuccessful calls to BellSouth, Broadway turned to City Council member Paul Woodson. Woodson called City Manager Dave Treme, and the city asked BellSouth to expedite the repair, Broadway said.

All phone services were restored by 5 p.m. Wednesday, Bingham and Broadway said.

Contact Michael Bostian at 704-797-4280 or mbostian@salisburypost.com .