Tonga's domestic fibre-optic submarine communications cable went out again yesterday following a series of strong earthquakes, including a 6.8m centred in Ha'apai, that also shook the capital.

Tonga Cable Acting CEO Mr Sosafate Kolo confirmed the outage, to Matangi Tonga this afternoon.

“Yes, after the earthquake yesteday, the last one, damaged the cable about 41km from Nuku'alofa,” he said. “ Right now it appears to be a complete cut.”

The Vava'u and Ha'apai Groups which are cut off from Tongatapu again will revert to using satellite capacity for their communications until the cable can be repaired.

The domestic cable has been in operation for only a week and a half after the previous break on June 29 was repaired at a cost of around USD$500,000 - although the final bill has not come in. That break was also caused by an earthquake and submarine landslide. The Cable Ship Lodbrog left Tonga last week after successfully retrieved the southern end of the cable which was found buried on the seafloor.

Sosafate said he was not surprised the cable was cut again given the instability of the area after the HTHH eruption in 2022. “We expected it to happen when we talked with the geologists about Hunga-Tonga Hunga-Ha'apai and they said those areas are not very stable. It will take three or four years for the seabed to stabilize after the big eruption there.”

Sosafate said they will have to call the cable repair ship back to Tonga. “Yes, that's what we are doing now. We have no plan of work yet,” He said maybe over the next two days they would be able to confirm when the work can be done to repair the cable again.

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Meanwhile, the Pacific Forum Leaders will fly to Vava'u Group on Thursday morning, 29 August, for their Leaders Retreat Meeting at the Puataukanave Hotel, Neiafu.