13 February 2008
Residents of a remote Welsh village have expressed concern that they are living in a communications 'black hole', following a fire scare.
Gwitherin in Conwy currently has no mobile phone coverage, no broadband connections and only an unreliable home phone service.
A recent chimney fire in the village has caused some to worry that fire or ambulance services could prove difficult to contact in the event of an emergency.
BT Openreach, for its part, says that it is working on an "innovative" solution in order to improve Gwitherin's intermittent home phone service.
"We have already carried out an extensive review of the network serving the area and undertaken a detailed field survey of existing cables to ensure we are providing maximum capacity over the existing network at all times," a spokesman added.
Concerns were also aired by local publican Dai Richardson, who said that his business had lost custom due to the village's communication problems.
"Occasionally the phones are not out but there is an intermittent fault which means the person phones in and the phone rings and rings," he said.
"For the person on the other end, they think you're just not picking up the phone."
© 2008 Adfero Ltd
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