Thought this until reading your comment! What a horrible fit.

I know this will get lost in the comments, but here’s an update for anybody who stumbles upon it: AT&T just came to fix my internet. The guy showed me further down the alley there’s a giant chunk - maybe 6 feet worth? - of this same cable. He said it looks like a crew tried to steal it but got scared. It had to have been multiple people to be able to get up so high to cut it and then to try to carry it off!

He let me pick up the little segment shown in this picture. I was SHOCKED by how heavy it is!!!! If copper is selling for $4/pound, the chunk in the alley has to be worth a fortune.

As for my internet, it just looks like whatever hooligans cut the copper cut through my fiber line while they were at it. But that’s a relatively easy fix once we get a bucket truck. I forgot to ask if anybody will bother to fix the copper cables. I’ll ask when he comes back!

Somebody in a comment somewhere described them as the thickness of an earring post, and that’s about right. Idk how many - I would say thousands!?!

Lol I did not cut it 🤣At first I thought it snapped from the storms, but now I realize it’s way too clean for that. But I have no idea who cut it or why. I didn’t even know what it was until the experts in these comments!!

Holy crap!!!! I’ve been waiting for somebody to put a number on it. That’s… a lot.

You guessed it! Known for shitty weather and even shittier utilities.

I noticed this! Also, sometimes when I try to report by phone number, it also asks for my service provider (and mine is never even one of the options on the list). Other times, it doesn’t ask and lets me just give my phone number. Very strange.

Thank you!

So cool!

I didn’t know at the time, but have since learned from the expertise in the comments. Who knew something so mundane could be so interesting!

I wish these things were underground. The thick black cables hanging all over the neighborhood are pretty unsightly. I had no idea (until today) that the inside was so cool!

I didn’t know what it was at the time, so I guess that does make me ballsy (or dumb, or both)

1,427 comments, this one made me chuckle 🤣

Thank you! I’ve gathered from the comments that it’s probably fine to touch, but that would just be such a horrible way to go. And an embarrassing story for my kid to have to tell people. So I have refrained.

From the comments, I’ve learned it’s for phone lines! Super interesting.

Alright, I’ll bite: what is a POTS?

I consider myself highly literate; I generally know the rules and follow them. But laying and lying both sound equally correct to me! I googled it, and see that it’s wrong, but I did not know the rule!

This is wild! Do you think that could’ve been what happened here? Somebody cutting it to steal the copper?

Do you think it’s possible somebody cut this to steal the copper?

I originally thought it was related to super nasty storms we had yesterday, but now that I’ve read the comments, I realize the cut is too clean for it to be an act of nature!

So cool!! I have learned more today about telephone cables than I realized there was to know.

I’m afraid it picked the wrong driveway - I didn’t even know it was a telephone cable until I came to the comment section 😂

Do you know what the deal is with the colors? Like do they correspond with individual houses?

Super interesting!! This is why I love Reddit. Does this mean I can touch it?

This was laying on top of my recycling bin in my driveway after the storms in Dallas Tuesday morning. Idk what kind of cable it is, but we don’t have power or internet, so feels like this could be related 😂 The other end is connected to the telephone pole at the end of my driveway.