QUEENSLAND FLOODS - OPTUS NETWORK LARGELY RESTORED

Mobile services restored in the Lockyer Valley, Ipswich, Kilcoy and more of Brisbane As of 11am today, due to the restoration of mains power in several Queensland flood affected areas overnight, Optus has been able to restore mobile sites in the Lockyer Valley, Ipswich, Kilcoy and more of Brisbane. With the majority of Optus mobile services now restored, impact to the Optus mobile network is largely localised to South Brisbane, Brisbane CBD and Emerald in addition to a small number of isolated base station outages in various parts of the Queensland State. As power availability improves we expect to restore the majority of services in the Brisbane area in the coming days. The majority of the HFC fixed network infrastructure in Ipswich has also been restored, with fixed home phone and internet services returned to more than 3000 residential customers today. Optus' priority remains to restore services as quickly as possible in Queensland to minimise any impact on our customers. Clare Gill, General Manager, Government and Corporate Affairs said, "With the restoration of power in some of the flood affected areas we are pleased to see our network is largely back to normal service levels with the return of services to the Lockyer Valley, Ipswich, Kilcoy and more parts of Brisbane. "Our operational efforts are focused on restoring all services as quickly as possible. We continue to deploy additional resources to Queensland from Melbourne and Sydney to ensure the needs of the recovery can be supported. "Until we are able to gain access to all our affected sites, the full extent of the damage to our infrastructure will not be known. We have assembled a senior management recovery team which is now focused on the recovery effort. Over the coming weeks the team will be planning for reconnecting customers and in the longer term the rebuilding of any damaged infrastructure. "As we enter the rebuild phase, we encourage anyone doing below the ground work to follow the 'dial before you dig' procedures by dialling 1100 to ensure that critical infrastructure is protected." Brisbane In Brisbane, Optus continues to experience some disruption to its mobile and fixed network infrastructure in the CBD and South Brisbane areas due to the power outage. There is a coverage overlap in most areas of Brisbane which will mitigate the loss of individual base stations. Services are gradually being restored as power availability resumes. Ipswich In Ipswich, while a few nodes on our HFC network are still affected, fixed home phone and internet services are largely restored. Emerald Optus has experienced loss of mobile services in Emerald due to a transmission issue. Plans are being made to deliver additional mobile coverage to the area by tonight. Sydney to Brisbane Links One of our Sydney to Brisbane links has experienced an optical fibre break in the Helidon area due to the floods. However, all protected services have been switched successfully to our coastal link, so residential and business customers have not been impacted. Optus technicians have identified the fibre damage and are now planning restoration activity. For information on assistance which Optus is providing, please click here. Media contact: Kasia Ciszak /Joshua Drayton Optus Corporate Affairs Tel: (02) 8082 7850