OCHO RIOS, St Ann — The police in this parish have launched an investigation into the alleged theft of Flow equipment that has left a number of residents in Breadnut Hill without Internet service for almost a month.

According to a representative from the telecommunications provider’s local office who would only identify herself as Miss Brown, there are plans to run cable so service can resume, but no firm date has been set. That is little consolation for residents like Jayden Cennant, a 19-year-old student who said he was in an online class on July 23 when his connection went awry.

“Me in a the middle of a Zoom meeting and me teacher just stuck out a nowhere. A so me realise that the Wi-Fi gone,” he said “I’m home now from school and it’s soon time for orientation and thing online and me would have the Wi-Fi to log on easily. But me have to be buying service which is costing me a whole heap and me is a school youth.”

“Mi just want dem to try and put back the cable so we don’t have to be paying for service that we not getting,” he added.

Others also expressed concern about the impact the service outage is having on their pockets.

“[Buying] data is killing me, because I can’t afford it. Normally me put on a 14-day plan for $1,250 and it can’t serve me because the megabytes done fast. Me not paying any bill until the service come back because I am not going to pay for what I am not getting,” said Carolyn Lightbourne.

She said she has never, in her 17 years living in the community, experienced such brazen theft.

“Them thief the cable from way down the road and that is a lot of wire, so I don’t know how them take it down. From me live here a the first we nuh have Wi-Fi. These people need to do better,” she scolded. “Me a have great challenges because me nuh have no TV, no phone because everything depend on the Wi-Fi. Me house dead.”

Sixty-five-year-old Noel Edwards is also feeling the loss. It has impacted his ability to keep in touch with family overseas.

“Right now is suffering because things that I would want to do, like call my children overseas and talk regular, I can’t do it. I have to be buying data now and put on credit all week around,” he complained.

It is said that thieves took off with the main server cablewhich runs through a section of the community.