Wikipedia goes dark after cables are cut

Online encyclopaedia Wikipedia was knocked offline on Monday thanks to two accidentally cut cables near a data centre in Florida.

The site, and various associated services, were inaccessible or extremely sluggish for over two hours beginning at around 1430 BST on Monday.

A status web page showed various parts of the Wikimedia network as suffering performance issues. Wikipedia ruled out any suggestion of malicious intent being behind problem. The two cables, which stretched between Tampa and Virginia, were broken for an hour and six minutes, the site said.