More than 14,500 Optus customers residing south of Melbourne experienced service interruptions today due to suspected vandalism.

The telecommunications provider reported that an underground fibre cable was severed within a Telstra pit on the Mornington Peninsula earlier today. This disruption affected both standard and emergency phone calls, as well as mobile data services, in the Frankston and Mornington Peninsula regions.

Fortunately, thanks to overlapping network coverage, customers could still reach emergency services by dialing Triple Zero.

Triple Zero Victoria confirmed there were no reported instances of failed calls to their emergency line during the outage period.

Optus announced that the problem had been fixed by 11:20 AM.

“We acknowledge the inconvenience this has caused and appreciate our customers’ patience,” stated an Optus representative.

Vandals are believed to have stolen copper from the pit, which damaged Optus’ sub-ducts in the process.

The matter has been reported to Victoria Police, who are investigating whether criminal damage, vandalism or copper theft occurred.

“If the outage was caused by a deliberate action, Victoria Police will launch a criminal investigation,” a Victoria Police spokesperson said.

Optus has been at the centre of a Senate inquiry after a failure to follow step one of an upgrade process caused a Triple Zero outage that was linked to three deaths in late September.

The telco was criticised for its handling of the incident as it waited almost a day to notify the federal government.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority is investigating the first outage, while Optus conducts its own internal review.

Greens Senator and chair of the inquiry into the Triple Zero outage, Sarah Hanson-Young, has today called for an urgent review of the telco’s licence.

“Optus has failed the Australian people again,” she said in a statement.

“They are clearly not capable of providing this essential service and keeping Australians safe.”