Tonga's internet could be down for more than two weeks after a violent volcanic eruption cut the kingdom's only undersea communications cable, isolating the country from contact with the outside world.
Saturday's eruption of the Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha'apai volcano prompted tsunami warnings and evacuation orders in neighbouring countries and caused huge waves on several South Pacific islands.
Images on social media showed waves crashing against homes on the shores.
The chair of Tonga Cable, Samiuela Fonua, said there were two cuts in the cable, but until volcanic activity ceased at Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha'apai, repair crew would not be cleared to access the cables.
"The condition of the site is still pretty messy at the moment," Mr Fonua said.
"We've been told that the volcanic activity is still pretty much going on.
Crew are waiting on clearance from the Tongan government and the company to allow divers into the water and repair work to begin.
Mr Fonua said there was also the risk of volcanic activity damaging the specialised vessel — the CS Reliance — which is operated by US company SubCom.
"There are not that many vessels around the world that could do this [repair]."
Mr Fonua said Tonga Cable might be able to provide more information about the duration of the repairs next week but, for now, "there's too much risk there".
To add to the delays, the ship will take a few of days to be prepared, after which, its crew will need to travel to Samoa to collect more equipment.
While some officials have satellite phones, the majority of Tonga has no way of communicating outside of the small island nation.
Reverend Loni Vaitohi is a Tongan community leader based in Shepparton, Victoria, and said not being able to contact loved ones or access updates on what is happening in Tonga, had been "devastating" and "surreal" for relatives living in Australia.
"As soon as we see each other, we cry a lot. We pray a lot.
"And the issue of mental health is heightened by this kind of helplessness and loneliness during this time."
Dr Amanda Watson is a research fellow at the Australian National University's (ANU) department of Pacific affairs and said the cable, which goes between Tonga and Fiji, had been damaged before.
In 2019, the cable was broken in at least two places by what was believed to be the anchor of a ship operating in an area that was supposed to be off-limits.
The repairs in 2019 took around two weeks.
Dr Watson said the cable was jointly owned by the Tongan Government, a state-owned enterprise in Tonga, and a private company.
"I imagine that the three of those will be working together quite closely to try to get the cable repaired as soon as possible," Dr Watson said.
She said Tonga was not the only Pacific island that relied on a single cable to connect with the outside world, and hoped to see additional cables put in place in the future to avoid complete outages such as this one.
Dr Anthony Bergin is a senior fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and said more work was needed to ensure the cables were more resilient in future.
"Australia should work with like-minded partners to undertake tabletop exercises around cable resilience because, if cables do break or are interfered with, it would be good if these countries had procedures in place to repair them."
Mr Fonua said a second cable had been "on the table", even before the cable was cut in 2019.
"It's a matter of securing funding and also support from our Tongan partners." he said.
"It's not easy to build a second cable around Tonga because it's a small country."
He said that, because of the the location of Tonga in relation to Fiji and Australia, a second cable would likely end up on the same side the current one is.
"So it's going be a tough one, but … the discussion is still going on at the moment," he said.
"Hopefully we'll come up with some solutions soon."
ABC/AFP
