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Hundreds of people in the Dorset town of Beaminster have reportedly been left without working broadband and digital phone connectivity for several days after a car crashed into one of Openreach’s telecoms (telegraph) poles in the area and promptly burst into flames. Police are currently still trying to locate the driver, which could suggest a criminal aspect.
The event itself, which happened near the A356 in Beaminster, occurred on Sunday (12th October 2025) night and a crew from the Beaminster Fire Station (credits for the picture), using one breathing apparatus and two hosereel jets, were finally able to extinguish the fire by 10:49pm. Unfortunately, the pole must have been carrying one of Openreach’s primary fibre cables, as it was initially reported to have disrupted connectivity for 1,000 customers in the area.
In an urban area it might only take a few hours to resolve a downed pole, or a few short days, but the situation becomes more complex once there’s something like a fire and car crash involved. In this case, the mitigating circumstances will have involved the need to make the site safe for engineers to work (e.g. the car was finally removed on Tuesday) and to allow time for the police to conduct their investigation first. Not to mention that the operator may have had to seek prior permission for traffic management measures etc.
An Openreach spokesperson said (BBC News):
“We’re fully assessing the impact and how much damage has been caused. Then we hope to have a clearer indication of exactly how long it will take before services are restored.
Installing a new pole and rebuilding the damaged fibre network is a complex task, but we understand how disruptive it is for local residents to be without broadband.
Our engineers are working as quickly and safely as possible to restore services and get things back to normal.”
At present it’s not known precisely when Openreach will be able to complete replacement of the pole and its cables. The operator has previously informed ISPreview that it can take an average of around 20 days to fix damaged poles, such as after a major storm. But over the years we’ve seen examples where, in rare cases of extreme damage, some smaller remote rural areas have been left to wait for several months before repairs (here, here and here).