South Jersey Verizon Wireless customers are back online following a large outage caused by Tuesday's thunderstorms

Verizon Wireless store
Verizon Wireless store (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
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Spokesman Sheldon Jones service was restored to customers in Atlantic, Burlington, Cape May, Salem, Cumberland, Camden and Gloucester counties around 2 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon.

The problem began around 1 a.m. early Wednesday because of a break in a fiber optic line called a fiber cut that carries data to cell sites affecting redundant equipment that provides a system back-up. Jones says that voice and data were also affected by the outage.

Customers in New Castle, Kent and Sussex counties in Delaware were restored earlier on Wednesday morning as were Delaware and Chester counties in Pennsylvania.

The website downdetector.com showed a large area of those reporting outages stretching across South Jersey from the Delaware River to Atlantic City, roughly the same area where over 200,000 Atlantic City Electric and PSE&G customers are still without power.

Officials say the outage affected cellphone calls to non-Verizon cellphone numbers and to 911. Customers say they're hearing busy signals.

Comcast spokesman Jeff Alexander says the company brought in additional personnel and generators to deal with outages. "Our technical crews are working wherever it’s safe to do so, assessing damage and beginning repairs," wrote Alexander in an email.

The Associated Press contributed to this report..

 

 

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