Tuesday night, a series of earthquakes beneath the seas off southeastern Taiwan snapped underwater cables connecting Hong Kong, Taiwan and China to North America, Japan and Korea. The real effect was felt when businesses reopened Wednesday morning and discovered that they couldn't make international phone calls, open U.S. and other foreign Web sites or rely to their e-mail.

"We depend on the Internet" and international phone service, says Edmund Wong, 26, sales administrator for a Hong Kong property firm. "Without them, we can't do anything."

Ships from Singapore and the Philippines hurried to the scene of the breakdown Thursday to start repairs. The Hong Kong government says that fixing undersea cables typically takes five to seven days; but the work could be delayed by aftershocks and damage to the seabed. For the time being, telecommunications operators will reroute phone traffic to undamaged cables, some of them through Europe.

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