Executives of Cable Bahamas Ltd (CBL) and NewCo meet with national leaders to discuss restoration efforts at NEMA Headquarters on New Providence, The Bahamas. L-R: John Gomez, COO, CBL; Damian Blackburn, CEO, NewCo; Anthony Butler, CEO, CBL; Prime Minister of The Bahamas, The Rt. Hon Perry Christie; Shane Gibson, Minister of Labour and National Insurance, and newly appointed Coordinator for the Hurricane Matthew Relief and Recovery; Allison Maynard Bahamas Attorney General; and, Captain Stephen Russell, director, NEMA.
Cable Bahamas announced yesterday that its restoration exercise remains at a steadfast pace, though a severe weather system hindered the company's repair efforts yesterday. Despite extensive damage to a number of islands hit by Category 4 Hurricane Matthew, 100 percent of the company's network is available on San Salvador, Exuma, Abaco, Bimini and Eleuthera, while over 70 percent of its network is now available on New Providence. The company also announced eight percent restoration on Grand Bahama, primarily in the areas of East Sunrise Highway, Midshipman Road, Pink Pearl Drive, East Beach Drive, Dolphin and Drum Fish Street, Green Turtle Street, Lunar Boulevard and Knots Boulevard.
Cable Bahamas (CBL) Vice President of Marketing David Burrows noted that the islands of The Bahamas took a direct hit with Hurricane Matthew, the first time in modern history. "This placed unprecedented stress on the country including infrastructure, services, government agencies, communities, families, individuals and businesses," Burrows said. "Over 90 percent of the population was directly affected," he added, noting that the company's systems and networks in the southern islands fared better than expected.
The company did not escape Hurricane Matthew's fury. The hurricane force winds impacted satellite dishes on the islands of Andros, Inagua, Exuma, the Berry Islands, Bimini and Long Island.
Burrows assured that company technicians are working relentlessly to rectify all service issues. "All of our recovery efforts are focused on the whole of The Bahamas, as our Florida operations did not sustain the kind impact that Hurricane Matthew unleashed on The Bahamas," Burrows stated.
Acknowledging that Grand Bahama, Inagua, Andros, New Providence and the Berry Islands were among the islands with significant damage from the Category 4 hurricane with winds over 150 miles per hour, John Gomez, chief operation officer (COO), said that technicians are restoring services on those islands as power becomes available to residents.
After 10 days, Grand Bahama now has only eight percent of its electricity services restored due to the tremendous devastation to Grand Bahama Power Company's (GBPC's) infrastructure, with over 1,250 distribution poles destroyed, including 250 transmission poles.
"Safety is and has always been a priority for us," Gomez said. "Our technicians are working closely with Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) and GBPC to ensure areas are safe before commencing the restoration of video, phone and Internet services." Gomez continued, "We are unable to move into any area until BPL and GBPC have restored power to those areas, as we are dependent on the electricity companies' infrastructure to provide service to our customers."
Gomez commended the company's emergency response group on a steadfast job at reconnecting customers across The Bahamas in the wake of the storm, working long hours to ensure activation of services as early as possible. The company has estimated that over 42,500 man hours thus far have been contributed to the restoration efforts. As the company moves into an unprecedented extended recovery time frame, CBL is constantly retooling its efforts to meet the changing demands of this wide-ranging restoration effort.
"We had our hurricane response team in place from Wednesday, October 5 at the Cable Bahamas command center, monitoring and managing our systems across the country, responding to incoming reports, assessing damage and coordinating crews in the field for 12 straight days now," Gomez stated.
Beverly Saunders, vice president of human resources at CBL, stated, "As a company, we first ensured that our staff, specifically those working on the restoration of services to our subscribers, had their homes secured and dry after hurricane Matthew, so that they could be laser focused on the restoration efforts."
She continued, "We understand there are many moving parts to this expansive restoration effort and if those responsible for those efforts are not whole those efforts can and would be compromised."
Saunders explained that the company's customer call center has seen an increase of 260 percent in call volume since Hurricane Matthew restoration work began, with staff handling more than 40,000 phone calls in that period.
The Cable Bahamas executives stressed the company's commitment to returning customers to 100 percent normalcy following the hurricane. On New Providence, the REV Store at the Mall at Marathon quickly resumed regular business hours for customers in need of assistance. A temporary help center was opened in its East Street south offices for customers to be able to come in without calling. The company also has been bringing regular service and restoration updates to its subscribers via the REV Facebook page, which has reached over 90,000 unique views and over 38,000 people have been engaged with the company's posts and social media staff. The company has also been utilizing radio, newspaper and Our TV on REVTV channel 212, which started live streaming the night Hurricane Matthew hit New Providence.
"We are doing our best to ensure that customers are informed of our restoration efforts," Burrows said. "These activities can take some time and we are grateful to our customers for displaying tremendous patience in this challenging and frustrating period. It is important to stress that while customers may have power on their street the distribution hub supplying their REV services may be on a nearby street that currently does not have commercial power. We understand and appreciate that this causes great frustration for our subscribers that do not know that the two are related to each other. We ask for continued patience as we work to complete the restoration exercise."
In an effort to quickly restore its customers, REV is asking that customers who have power but are still without REV services to contact the company's customer care center at 601-2200 (Nassau) or 1-242-300-2200 (toll-free) and provide their telephone number and the name on their account.
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