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Africa Tech Struck: Cairo Data Center Blaze Kills 4, Halts Internet

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Cairo Data Centre Blaze: Fatalities, Widespread Internet and Communication Outage Rocks Egypt

A devastating fire erupted yesterday at a crucial data centre located within a 10-story Telecom Egypt building in Cairo, resulting in tragic loss of life and significant disruption to digital services across the nation. The incident claimed the lives of four workers and left at least 22 others injured, marking a severe blow to Egypt’s telecommunications infrastructure. According to Amr Talaat, Egypt’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology, the inferno’s impact was immediately felt, causing extensive communication disturbances throughout the capital city and beyond.

Unprecedented Digital and Economic Disruption

The blaze swiftly led to a national communications standstill, halting phone calls and severely impeding internet access for countless users. Data from Netblocks, an internet monitoring organization, revealed the drastic scale of the outage, showing Egypt’s national network connectivity plummeted to a mere 62% of its typical level. The ripple effect extended far beyond basic connectivity, crippling essential digital banking services. Transactions involving credit cards, ATM withdrawals, and online banking operations were widely affected, leading most banks to close their doors for the day. Furthermore, the incident disrupted air traffic, though the civil aviation ministry confirmed early on Tuesday that all previously grounded flights had successfully departed. The economic repercussions also hit the financial sector directly, with the Egyptian Stock Exchange pausing trading on Tuesday due to the widespread operational disruptions that compromised the efficiency of its trading system. Telecom Egypt also issued a statement acknowledging the significant impact of the incident.

The fire at Cairo’s telecommunications data centre underscores the profound fragility of modern digital infrastructure. The extensive outage, impacting everything from daily phone calls and internet browsing to critical banking services and even air travel, highlights Egypt’s reliance on these central hubs. The swift response to resume critical services, particularly air traffic, indicates efforts to mitigate the immediate fallout, yet the economic and social cost of such an event remains substantial for the African tech landscape.

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