Telstra chief executive Sol Trujillo expressed on Monday deep sympathy for those affected by the Victoria bushfire tragedy.
"Telstra will also make a cash contribution of $500,000 to the Victorian Bushfire Appeal, as well as matching dollar for dollar personal contributions made by Telstra employees up to $250,000," Mr Trujillo said.
The bushfires have caused substantial damage to Telstra's telephone exchange and base station infrastructure, as well as to cabling.
"Thousands of phone lines and broadband internet connections are down," he said.
Telstra teams are working as quickly as possible to repair network assets and to restore connections and services but the full extend of the damage was not yet known, he said.
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