‘Why in front of my house?’: East Arlington water main break leaves families without Wi-Fi and water

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Things are beginning to get back to normal for some families in the Hickory Manor subdivision, after six hours without water on Wednesday. However, some are without cable and Wi-Fi services.

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JEA said the following streets, in East Arlington, were impacted:

Willoughby Lane
Willoughby Court
Friargate Court
Eaglesham Drive (west of Trowbridge Drive)
Hickory Manor Drive (south of Hickory Creek Boulevard)

“The first thing that crossed my mind is how could something like that happen?” John Burke said. “Why in front of my house?”

The street in front of his home on Hickory Manor Drive looked more like a river.

“The sidewalk collapsed, broke cables,” Burke said. “I had a big palm tree sitting in the yard, and it fell over in the hole. It was a mess.”

JEA said damage from a third party—which AT&T has since claimed responsibility for—resulted in an eight inch pipe rupturing and impacting 75 customers in the neighborhood.

“They were in here. They took care of business,” Terry Weatherhead said. He lives two doors down from the Burke’s.

While there was minimal impact on Weatherhead, other neighbor we spoke with fear it could happen again.

“They’ve been out here for the last three weeks installing cable,” Burke said.

AT&T sent us this statement in response to the disruption: “As we work to bring high-speed fiber internet to more communities, our goal is to minimize impact on residents as much as possible. As soon as our contractor was aware of any damage, the local utility provider was notified and is currently on site to make repairs as quickly as possible. We apologize to residents for the inconvenience and will work with our contractor to resolve any impacts from their work.”

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