COLUMBIANA COUNTY, Ohio - Thieves looking for copper knocked out phone service to a part of Columbiana County, including the West Point Fire Department.

Copper theft is nothing new. But these thieves went to extraordinary heights to get copper wiring, stealing about 300 feet of phone line and damaging another 200 feet of fiber optic wire on Route 30 just outside of West Point.

West Point Fire Chief Wayne Chamberlain says the department went without an emergency line for four to six hours before they were notified the phone service was out. They then had the calls directed to the Lisbon Fire Department.

But anyone who called during the time the line was out would have gotten a recording saying it was disconnected. And if there had been an emergency, it could have turned into a tragedy.

Local businesses were also affected by the outage. It wasn't life or death at Summer Fun Pools, but it was serious business. "We know that we lost four sales this morning before noon, and we only open at 10, on heaters because people couldn't run their credit cards," said Donna Campbell from Summer Fun Pools.

On the other side of the building Campbell's Grocery store lost sales as well. "People can't call in their orders, they can't use the credit card machine, they can't use the food stamp machine," said Dolly Campbell.

Phone service is now back up and running and police say for now, no one seems to know who the thieves are who caused all the problems.