The Saudi Telecommunications Company (STC) announced on Thursday that another network has gone down, this time disrupting mobile and landline services in the Eastern Province.

This follows on the heels of a fire at a facility in Khamis Mushayt on Sunday, which disrupted services in large parts of the Asir region, on the country’s west coast.

The company said its technicians in the Eastern Province had cut a double fiber optic cable that saw all mobile and landline services interrupted.

Work is underway to restore services in the affected areas, it said. Many Royal Commission of Jubail staff members were using internal networks instead of landlines to keep working.

Mubeen Patel, an academic working for the commission, said that the disruption has made it difficult for him to arrange a taxi to Dammam airport for the summer vacation.

“As you know this is a busy period, everyone’s leaving and you have a lot of last minute things to do. Not knowing whether you have a ride or not can be stressful.”

Meanwhile, the company said it is working to restore services in Khamis Mushayt and other areas following the fire on Sunday.

“The full restoration of network services for the Mobile Generation II and III to Khamis Mushayt will be early next week. We were able to restore services to 30 percent of the telephone and data networks. All the emergency work to counter the effects of the fire will be done by the end of next week,” the company stated.

The police had on Wednesday ruled out arson at the STC facility in Khamis Mushayt in the wake of rumors that some customers had started the fire to take revenge for issues related to STC billing and poor services.

A technical committee comprising Civil Defense and STC officials are still investigating the incident and did not yet pinpoint the actual cause of the fire, according to reports.

About 80 percent of landline services had been cut in Abha, Khamis Mushayt, Tareeb, Alamadh, Alsbejh and Tatleet. Most of the residents in these areas had turned to Mobily and Zain networks.