Business News Americas | January 3, 2011 | Patrick Nixon
Chilean telecommunications networks suffered minimum disruption following Sunday’s (Jan 2) magnitude-7.1 earthquake in the south of the country, according to information from telecoms regulator Subtel and operators.
No deaths or damage was reported by national emergency office Onemi, though thousands fled from the coast to higher ground, reminded of the devastating tsunami that hit Chile on February 27, following a magnitude-8.8 earthquake.
Subtel reported no network failures, only some congestion caused by an increase in traffic and some power outages in the Araucania region.
Subtel head Jorge Atton said in a tweet that “to double network capacity, we have deactivated automatic SMS reception messages.”
Andres Wallis, director of corporate affairs for Chile’s largest mobile operator, Telefonica, which operates the Movistar brand, reiterated that eliminating SMS automatic messages had been a great help.
