About 7,500 Telus customers were left without phone service in southeastern Alberta Wednesday.

A dozen communities from Delia to Altario were affected when a maintenance crew accidentally cut a fibre optic cable in the town of Castor, about 140 kilometres east of Red Deer, around 11 a.m.

Telus technicians are on site working to restore service as quickly as possible, but spokesman Chris Gerritsen could not say when the repairs will be finished.

Many residents in those sparsely populated communities rely on Telus services in case of emergencies.

Gerritson says the company has a safety protocol for situations like this.

"Our network-operations people notified the local emergency-operations personnel in those areas, and they institute their action plan. Sometimes their plan is to station somebody [or] an emergency vehicle at the top of Main Street, for example," he said.