Cable-chewing beavers take out town’s Internet in “uniquely Canadian” outage

Enlarge / A wild beaver works furiously in Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming. (credit: Getty Images | Jeff R Clow)

About 900 Internet users in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, lost service for 36 hours when beavers chewed through an underground fiber cable in what network operator Telus called a "very bizarre and uniquely Canadian turn of events."

"Our team located a nearby dam, and it appears the beavers dug underground alongside the creek to reach our cable, which is buried about three feet underground and protected by a 4.5-inch thick conduit. The beavers first chewed through the conduit before chewing through the cable in multiple locations," the statement from Telus said, according to a CBC article posted Sunday.

The beavers apparently used some of the Telus materials to build their dam. Telus provided Ars with these photos of the damaged cable and the beaver dam:

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