Thousands of people in the South Yorkshire village of Thurscoe and the surrounding areas were left without broadband or telephone connections for two days following a cable theft, police said.

South Yorkshire Police said it received reports on the morning of Friday, 16 October, that manhole covers on Nicholas Lane in Goldthorpe were stolen and wiring in the area was damaged.

The outage, which also affected businesses, continued through Friday and Saturday.

Openreach said engineers worked as quickly as possible to repair the “extensive” damage.

Residents in Carcroft, Doncaster, were also affected by separate incidents of cable theft that affected internet and telephone services last week, police said.

Inspector Alison Carr said there had been a significant rise in such thefts across Doncaster since early summer.

She said police had recovered more than £1 million in copper cables from the Doncaster area since the beginning of the “spike”.

High-speed car chase

Separately, a high-speed car chase in North Yorkshire late on Sunday night led to the recovery of a large quantity of cables.

North Yorkshire police received a report of a balaclava-wearing suspect cutting high-voltage cables from equipment at Scotch Corner services at 23:40 BST on Sunday.

Police pursued a black Mini Cooper north on the A1(M) at speeds of more than 140mph.

The car clipped a police vehicle, then spun into a hedgerow in the County Durham area, after which two men were arrested and remain in custody, police said.