‘Total chaos’ as powercut brings tourist town to a halt

One of the country’s main tourist towns was plunged into commercial chaos and cut off from the rest of the world for several hours yesterday as a result of a major communications network failure.

Businesses and private homes in Dingle, Co Kerry, were without a telephone service, internet access and other essential communications tools for much of the day due to serious technical difficulties.

The communications crash prevented credit card and ATM transactions in stores, brought internet and ISDN systems to a standstill and disrupted landline and mobile phone networks. Local bank branches had to close until basic computer services were restored.