THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 8, 1996 TAG: 9602070157
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 09 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY SUSIE STOUGHTON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 65 lines
What's a stormbound family to do when the television suddenly becomes as snowy as the weather outside?
That was the question confronting thousands of Suffolk cable television customers last weekend, and their remedy made matters worse.
Power surges were to blame, said manager Jack Edwards of Falcon Cable TV. And while the company worked to fix it, impatient customers who disconnected converter boxes kept their cable signals from being restored.
By opening time Monday, the company's business office on Moore Avenue looked like a department store holding the sale of the century. Customers toting converter boxes streamed in, and they were not amused to find their ingenuity faulty.
Edwards offered this explanation:
A power surge disabled controls Friday, when Hampton Roads was hit by an ice storm, but everything was reset by closing time.
``Then Saturday, when we opened up, it looked like the sky had fallen out,'' he said. Lights blinked across panels of computerized equipment.
Account data, including information about where to send cable signals when service was restored, had been deleted.
Within 10 minutes after employees inserted back-up diskettes, the computers were again spurting out names and addresses. Then they started a program to restart the 17,000 converters, one box at a time.
However, many customers had disconnected the boxes and hooked cable wires directly to their televisions. That provided basic channels but not premium features, such as HBO and other movie channels, but it also caused those customers to miss the restart signal.
Service was back to normal Monday, unless boxes remained disconnected, he said.
As those without full service came to the office, a customer representative asked for their telephone number and told them their account would be reactivated.
Many left, looking bewildered. Some asked, ``Are you sure that's all I have to do?''
Others were irate, even when told of the weekend's freak happenings.
``What did you do, close the whole place down and go home?'' one man barked as he stomped out.
``We can't keep going like this,'' said Edwards, predicting that today would be better. ``We don't have that many customers.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos by
JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Cattails encased in ice near Bowers Hill in Suffolk look like frozen
hot dogs on sticks waiting to be barbecued.
A wrought iron chair takes on the look of a sugared confection.
Icicles make a mockery of a street sign marking Spring Meadow Lane.
A fender and exhaust pipe show that this car could use a little time
to warm up.
KEYWORDS: WINTER STORM CABLE TELEVISION by CNB