21 August 2025
State-owned telecommunications provider Telkom Indonesia has announced plans to repair a damaged subsea cable that has been disrupting internet services in South and Central Papua since Saturday. The repair effort will be carried out in two phases, beginning with a temporary fix followed by a permanent restoration..jpg?lu=993)
The initial phase involves deploying a vessel from Makassar Port to assess the cable’s condition and pinpoint the location of the break. Once identified, new cables will be loaded onto the vessel, tested, and reconnected to restore services. Telkom has indicated that this phase should bring internet connectivity in the affected regions back to normal by the first week of September.
The second phase will focus on implementing a permanent repair, which is expected to cause brief service interruptions on the first day and during the final two days of the process. Telkom aims to complete all repair activities by the third week of September.
The cause of the cable break has not been disclosed, nor has the specific subsea system affected. However, Telkom owns the SMPCS Packet-2 system, operational along the north, west, and south coasts of Papua since 2015. The only other subsea connection serving South and Central Papua is the Palapa Ring East, completed in 2019 by Palapa Timur Telematika, a subsidiary of Mora Telematika Indonesia (Moratelindo).
