Ketchikan experienced its second internet outage in 10 days on Aug. 11 due to copper thieves in Canada, causing troubles for businesses and community members lasting more than eight hours until dinnertime.

The previous internet outage occurred on Aug. 2 and lasted more than 10 hours.

“It is unprecedented to have (internet outages) this quick. We usually don’t have them this often,” said Matt McLaren, telecommunications division manager at Ketchikan Public Utilities.

The interruptions were caused by damaged cables in Canada, where the municipally owned utility gets its internet service through fiber-optic lines operated by a company called CityWest. Ketchikan’s link is through an undersea cable to Prince Rupert, British Columbia, which connects to landlines strung through Canada.

A nearly identical copper theft occurred on May 4, affecting thousands of customers in northwest British Columbia and Ketchikan.

GCI, which also provides internet services in Ketchikan, was not affected by the outage. The company connects with an undersea fiber-optic network that stretches from Southeast Alaska to the U.S. West Coast.

“It looks like it was theft again, or vandalism, just outside of Whitecourt (Alberta),” McLaren said of the Aug. 11 shutdown in Ketchikan. Whitecourt is almost 600 miles east of Prince Rupert.

On that same day, a vandal also cut a line in Calgary, Alberta, Ketchikan Public Utilities reported. According to a news report in the Calgary Herald on Aug. 11, there were 993 incidents of copper theft and vandalism across Canada between January and June, 78% more than in the same period last year.

The Aug. 11 break in the CityWest line affected much of north and central British Columbia, from Prince George west to areas including Terrace, Prince Rupert and Haida Gwaii, according to Canadian news reports.

McLaren said Ketchikan normally could use a secondary internet land route with a cable in Alberta, “but that secondary route burned about two weeks ago with the wildfires down there.”

He said CityWest is working on a subsea fiber cable from Prince Rupert to Vancouver, B.C. “Once they complete that, then that will be another path we can get on as well, so we’d have a secondary path that way.”

That marine cable, if everything goes as planned, should be ready for use by the end of 2026, he said.