Learn Spanish (Latin America): Acabábamos de comunicarnos cuando falló la cobertura. - We had just communicated when the coverage failed.

Acabábamos de comunicarnos cuando falló la cobertura.

We had just communicated when the coverage failed.

Breakdown of Acabábamos de comunicarnos cuando falló la cobertura.

fallar

to fail (machines, plans) / to crash

Questions & Answers about Acabábamos de comunicarnos cuando falló la cobertura.

Why do we use the imperfect tense acabábamos here to mean 'we had just'?

The phrase acabar de followed by an infinitive means 'to have just done something.' When you want to say you had just done something in the past, you use the imperfect tense of acabar (like acabábamos). This acts as a background state right before another event happens.

Could I put the nos before the verbs instead of attaching it to comunicar?

Yes! When you have a conjugated verb followed by an infinitive, you can either attach the pronoun to the end of the infinitive to get comunicarnos, or place it right before the conjugated verb to get Nos acabábamos de comunicar. Both mean exactly the same thing.

Does comunicarnos mean 'communicate ourselves'?

In this context, the nos is reciprocal, meaning 'each other.' So comunicarnos means 'communicate with each other' or 'get in touch with each other,' rather than doing something to ourselves.

Why is falló in the preterite tense while acabábamos is in the imperfect?

This is a classic 'interrupting action' scenario. The imperfect acabábamos de comunicarnos sets the background scene describing a state we were in. The preterite falló is the sudden, completed event ('when the coverage failed') that interrupts that timeline.