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Warning over slow internet amid Seacom maintenance

Johannesburg - Maintenance on fibre cables in Egypt could cause slow internet browsing speeds and downloads in South Africa on Wednesday.

Seacom manages a 17 000km undersea fibre broadband cable that connects to places along Africa’s eastern coastline such as Mombasa in Kenya and Mtunzini in South Africa. The cable also has connecting links to Europe and parts of North Africa.

Internet service providers in South Africa, such as MWEB, use the Seacom cable to help provide data capacity to their customers.

But maintenance on the cable could cause slower than average internet speeds in South Africa, MWEB warned on Wednesday.

“Seacom are carrying out maintenance today which should continue until 22:00 this evening. This may potentially cause slow browsing and downloads during peak times,” MWEB told customers on its Facebook page on Wednesday.

MWEB said it has secured capacity on an alternative route during the Seacom maintenance. But MWEB said that because it is “operating at reduced international capacity for the day” users could still experience reduced speeds.

Meanwhile, Seacom has further explained to Fin24 about what the maintenance in Egypt entails.

“Seacom has a planned maintenance activity that has been scheduled on 29th April 2015 to repair a shunt fault near Abu Talat,” Linda Carter, who is the head of marketing at Seacom’s shared services, told Fin24 in an emailed statement.

“All unprotected Seacom transmission services will be impacted for an estimated 12-hour period on this date. Seacom’s IP (internet protocol) platform, and customers on that platform, as well as customers who have taken restoration services from Seacom during this period will still be up and running,” Carter said.

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