A flood of spam emails brought down all personal email accounts serviced by one the Island?s major internet communications companies yesterday evening. Technicians worked for more than three hours to clear the jam which shut down the email service for North Rock Communication customers.

The problem hit at exactly the moment many email account holders were getting home from work and logging on to check their e-mails. Corporate email accounts were also affected by the problem, which was caused by an ?exponentially large? amount of spam flooding into North Rock?s central email server.

?It tied up all the space and made it impossible for other emails to get through,? explained Che Barker, North Rock Communications marketing manager. ?We had to take the system down and clear out all the spam emails. If it was a single isolated incident then it will remain clear, but there may be some latency.?

He added: ?We strive to give 100 percent up time for our customers, but when there are people who want to push spam through it?s not always possible. The problem showed up around 4.45 p.m. and that?s a busy time because people are getting home and want to check their email.?