On Monday 13 April, roadworks near Boundary Road cut through an NBN fibre cable and its conduit, knocking out internet for a chunk of Armstrong Creek. It took over 38 hours to fix. If you were affected — or you just want to know what actually happened — here’s the full picture, based on what residents reported and what NBN’s outage portal showed.
Which areas were hit
This was an NBN-only outage. If you’re on Opticomm (parts of Warralily, The Mount, Coastal Rise), you weren’t affected — different cables, different network entirely. That’s why some neighbours had internet and others didn’t. Note that Warralily has a mix of NBN and Opticomm depending on the street — so even within the same estate, experiences varied.
- Anchoridge (widespread — total dropout from 2pm Monday)
- Around Warralily Rd / Horseshoe Bend Rd intersection
- Winfield Court
- Rutherford
- Warralily (Opticomm streets — some Warralily streets are on NBN and were affected)
- Ashbury
- Harriott
- Charlemont Rise
The outage swept roughly south from Woolworths towards Horseshoe Bend Road. If you were outside that corridor, you likely kept your connection even on NBN.
Check the white box on the wall where your internet comes in — it’ll say Opticomm or Uniti if you’re on the private network. They’re completely separate infrastructure.
What caused it
Roadworks near the retirement village on Boundary Road damaged an NBN fibre cable. Both the cable and the conduit it runs through were cut — meaning it wasn’t a simple splice repair.
NBN classified the fault as P3 (lower priority) after determining it only affected part of Armstrong Creek rather than the entire suburb. That classification frustrated a lot of people, because “partial outage” doesn’t feel partial when you’re the one who can’t work.
The timeline
The damage was identified quickly, but the permit process meant essentially nothing happened for an entire business day. That was the part that stung most for people working from home.
ISPs had no control over this
Residents on Optus, Telstra, Aussie Broadband, AGL, Exetel, and Vodafone all reported outages. Meanwhile, people on Superloop, Belong, and Origin reported working connections — but that was because of where they lived (outside the affected area), not because of their ISP.
Your internet provider doesn’t own the cables. NBN owns and maintains the fibre infrastructure. Your ISP buys access to it. When a cable gets cut, every ISP on that cable goes down. Switching providers wouldn’t have helped.
The frustrating part is that NBN doesn’t deal with the public directly. You call your ISP, your ISP contacts NBN, and you wait. Several residents reported being told “4 to 24 hours” by offshore support with no further detail. One person received a $3 bill credit for a full day of lost work.
The mobile hotspot problem
The universal backup plan was mobile hotspotting — which worked until everyone in the area tried it at once. Mobile towers have limited capacity, and when hundreds of households suddenly shift to 4G/5G, speeds plummet. Residents in Anchoridge specifically noted that mobile signal was too weak to hotspot reliably even under normal conditions.
The Armstrong Creek library was the most-mentioned alternative by people who needed a connection for work.
A separate, ongoing issue
This cable-cut outage was a one-off event, but it’s not the only internet issue in the area. In community posts going back to early March, some residents — particularly on Aussie Broadband over Opticomm — have reported regular intermittent dropouts around midday, requiring router and Opticomm NTD resets. That’s a different problem with different causes, unrelated to this fibre cut.
If you’re experiencing recurring dropouts rather than a one-off outage, it’s worth working out whether the problem is the network, your router, or your WiFi — they each need different fixes.
What you can do next time
Outages like this will happen again — roadworks and fibre cables don’t always coexist peacefully. Here’s what helps:
- Check the NBN outage map first — nbnco.com.au/support/network-status. If there’s a known outage, calling your ISP won’t speed up the fix.
- Know which network you’re on. NBN outage? Opticomm homes are fine. Opticomm outage? NBN homes are fine.
- Have a mobile backup plan. A dedicated mobile broadband device with an external antenna is far more reliable than sharing your phone’s connection.
- Lodge a TIO complaint if the impact is serious. The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman exists for situations where outages cause genuine financial harm.
If you work from home, backup internet isn’t optional
This outage was a wake-up call for a lot of people. If your income depends on being online, treating your internet as a single point of failure is a risk — and one that’s surprisingly cheap to mitigate compared to the cost of a lost workday.
A full-time remote worker earning $100,000 loses roughly $400 per day when they can’t connect. A self-employed consultant billing $150–$250/hour? That’s $1,200–$2,000 in revenue gone. And that’s before you count missed client calls, rescheduled meetings, and the stress of scrambling to find a hotspot.
Built-in 4G/5G backup
Several ISPs bundle automatic mobile backup into their NBN plans. When your fixed connection drops, the modem switches over without you lifting a finger. Telstra Smart Modem 4 is the standout — business plans get uncapped 5G backup speeds (home plans cap at 25/5 Mbps). Aussie Broadband offers 4G backup on business plans with unlimited data.
Starlink on standby
Buy the dish, keep it on Standby Mode ($8.50/month). When an outage hits, upgrade to a full plan through the app, get 100–200 Mbps within minutes, then drop back to Standby when your NBN returns. No contracts. If it saves you even one lost workday per year, you’re ahead.
Dedicated 4G/5G hotspot + antenna
An external antenna mounted near a window gives you significantly better signal than your phone. Options include the Telstra 5G Hotspot 2 (carrier-locked) or the Netgear Nighthawk M6 Pro (~$840, carrier-unlocked). For marginal signal areas like parts of Anchoridge, directional antennas make the difference.
If you work from home, internet costs are tax-deductible — either 70c/hour (fixed rate) or actual cost method. Backup connections for work continuity and Starlink hardware may qualify for instant asset write-off (under $20,000). Talk to your accountant about your specific situation.
The bottom line: a backup internet setup might cost you $100–$200/year to maintain. A single lost workday costs significantly more.
Need help getting back online?
Whether it’s sorting out issues from this outage, setting up a backup connection so you’re covered next time, or just figuring out why your WiFi was already shaky before the cable got cut — I’m Karl from Why Oh WiFi, I’m local, and I deal with these exact networks every week.
Call or text 0489 998 445, or send a message. Happy to answer a quick question for free if it sounds like a known outage rather than something that needs fixing on your end.