Sandy Took Out 25% Of Cell Towers
Hurricane
Sandy put one quarter of the wireless cell towers in the Northeast out of commission, according to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, who warned that number may increase unless power is restored in a
timely fashion.
Although Genachowski didn’t give a precise number of cell phone towers damaged or deprived of power by Sandy, it is easily in the thousands. In 2010, the FCC
estimated the total number of wireless cell towers in the U.S. at 266,623, and a large proportion of these are located in the densely-populated Northeast region.
In August 2011, Hurricane
Irene disabled about 6,500 cell phone towers.
While it is rare for cell phone towers to actually topple over in a storm, many will have been damaged by flooding in ground-level
equipment rooms or windblown debris. This huge repair job means it could be weeks before some towers are restored to service -- and the number of cell towers out of service could actually increase in
coming days.
One of the biggest issues facing cell tower operators is loss of power, and cell towers currently relying on backup generators could begin running out of fuel over the
next week, Genachowski noted. Given the widespread disruptions to the power grid, which utility providers say could take 10 days or more to repair in places, it’s possible more cell towers will
go dark.
Outages were reported in cell service and cable systems beginning Sunday evening and increased as Hurricane Sandy made landfall, battering New Jersey and New York City Monday
and Tuesday. Verizon said two key switching centers in Manhattan were severely affected by the storm. The company’s corporate headquarters in Lower Manhattan and offices in Long Island and
Queens were also flooded, knocking out backup power at those locations.
AT&T and Sprint also reported service disruptions resulting from power outages and storm damage.
Telecommunications Tower from Shutterstock
Recent MediaDailyNews Articles
-
Aereo Is Not Just For Cord-Cutters May 23, 6:34 p.m.
Are cord-cutters most likely to subscribe to Aereo? Not necessarily, according to early returns. CEO Chet ... -
Cars.com Drops Flag On NASCAR.com Sponsorship May 23, 6:25 p.m.
Cars.com has a need for speed. The site has a deal with Turner to sponsor a ... -
Worldwide Pay TV On The Rise, Big Growth In Asia May 23, 4:17 p.m.
North American pay TV subscribers may continue to show little or no growth for the first ... -
Activision Blizzard's Campaign Wins Grand Effie May 23, 4:12 p.m.
Video game marketer Activision Blizzards’ ad campaign “The Vet and the nOOb” for "Call of Duty: ... -
Mag Bag: Bonnier, Source Interlink Swap Mags May 23, 4:09 p.m.
Bonnier, Source Interlink Swap Mags Enthusiast publisher Bonnier Corp. continued wheeling and dealing this week with ... -
Madison Avenue Is Mad As Hell, March Mad: Takes More, Not Less Network TV May 23, 7:46 a.m.
Demand for network TV advertising, which had been lagging so far this year, surged in April ... -
NY1 Show Goes National May 22, 7:32 p.m.
Time Warner Cable (TWC) will begin distributing a show about Broadway and theater at large to ... -
TV Model: Nets, Stations Split Retrans 50/50 May 22, 6:02 p.m.
Gray Television CFO Jim Ryan suggested that networks may capture more than half of an affiliate’s ... -
Newspaper, Magazine Ad Fortunes Continue To Decline May 22, 5:59 p.m.
The release of fourth-quarter figures for newspaper advertising and first-quarter figures for magazine ad pages earlier ... -
Equifax Taps Dentsu's 360i As Lead Agency May 22, 5:24 p.m.
Data collection company Equifax has selected Dentsu shop 360i to be its lead agency -- for ...
Be the first to comment on "Sandy Took Out 25% Of Cell Towers"
Leave a Comment