WOW! drops subcontractor after repeated Longwood utility breaks

Residents in one Longwood neighborhood are still living with the fallout from repeated underground utility work, and WOW! now says it is cutting ties with a subcontractor after the latest break triggered another boil-water notice and fresh damage near Bearss Circle.

The City of Longwood said the May 5 break was caused by third-party utility work by WOW! and its subcontractors during fiber installation. The city issued a precautionary boil-water notice for affected areas, and officials said messages about the notice were left on the doors of homes nearby. On the street, the disruption was visible: a concrete truck, a freshly repaired driveway and the latest sign that another line had been hit.

The incident was not an isolated one. Earlier reporting from April 17 described a water line break around 2:30 p.m. while telecommunications contractors were preparing to run conduit in the public right-of-way. Neighbors in Hidden Oaks said they worried the problem could happen again, and city officials noted then that water from the break had nowhere to go but downhill into a cul-de-sac and a nearby pond.

City Manager William Watts said in April that Longwood had already recorded more than a dozen underground utility strikes in 2026, with three considered significant. That tally has turned fiber optic installation into more than a broadband upgrade for nearby homeowners. It has become a recurring infrastructure problem that has damaged driveways, interrupted water service and left residents waiting to see whether the next trench will hit another line.

WOW! told News 6 it would no longer work with the subcontractor involved and would make other changes to prevent future incidents. The company did not say in the available details how those changes will be enforced or how Longwood homeowners should expect repairs and service disruptions to be handled if another break occurs. For Bearss Circle and nearby streets, the question is whether the new oversight will finally stop a cycle that has already brought repeated breaks, repairs and boil-water notices to an established Seminole County neighborhood.