The Wireless Industry Association and the Telecommunications Industry Foundation published a white paper today to provide clarity and insight regarding the risk category for a new or existing communication structure by comparing the risk categories from Rev H (Table 2-1) to the risk categories defined in IBC for buildings and other structures. The document is available here. The ANSI/TIA-222 Standard …
FCC’s O’Rielly wiggles by an ethics violation with a wrist slap
FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly violated a federal ethics law when he called for the re-election of President Trump at a panel discussion with fellow FCC Republicans Ajit Pai and Brendan Carr at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on February 23, according to the US Office of Special Counsel (OSC). The violation came to light after the OSC’s Deputy Chief …
Bet on the Sprint/T-Mobile mega merger wounding towercos
If the proposed T-Mobile and Sprint merger announced Sunday is approved by federal regulators, both companies said that they expect the marriage creating the nation’s second largest carrier would be sometime in July 2019. However, it’s been identified by the carriers that fully combining the companies is another three to four years, possibly longer. Displaying their lack of fundamental industry …
T-Mobile and Sprint agree to merge creating severe competition for rival AT&T
After years of negotiations, T-Mobile and Sprint announced today that they have finally agreed to tie the knot and will merge in an all-stock transaction of 9.75 Sprint shares for each T-Mobile US share. Based upon Friday’s closing share prices this represents a value of approximately $59 billion for Sprint and approximately $146 billion for the combined company. The new company will …
India tower deal drops American Tower to the world’s third largest towerco
India’s Bharti Infratel Ltd has agreed to merge with Indus Towers, in a deal that creates the world’s second largest telecom tower company, a title that American Tower formerly held. The new company with more than 163,000 towers has an estimated equity value of $14.6 billion Indus Towers’s tower total lags considerably behind the world’s largest tower owner, China Tower …
AT&T’s CitySwitch agreement is a clear unveiling of their current tower leasing concerns
In a shot over the bow of the major tower owners signaling that they’re not pleased with their current leasing models and are looking for alternatives, AT&T announced today that the carrier and CitySwitch signed an agreement for building new cell towers to-suit based on future wireless network needs. CitySwitch will begin tower construction plans as early as the second …
Erector’s owner identified as the deceased worker in horrific Missouri tower collapse
Steve Lemay, 56, of Washington state, the owner of Steve Lemay LLC, has been identified by authorities as the erector who died yesterday morning when an 1,892-foot TV tower in Webster County, Mo. collapsed while his crew was performing structural upgrades in order for Ozarks Public Television KOZK to comply with their FCC repack requirement to move from channel 23 to …
Tech is killed after 1,892-foot tower collapses while being repack retrofitted
UPDATE: April 20, 2018 – The deceased has been identified by authorities to be Steven Lemay, the owner of the erection company that was performing structural upgrades. April 19, 2018 – An 1,892-foot TV tower in Webster County, Mo. collapsed this morning just before 10 a.m., killing a tall tower worker and injuring at at least five others with non-life-threatening injuries, …
T-Mobile slapped with a $40 million FCC fine for false network coverage ringtones
T-Mobile has agreed to cough up $40 million to the FCC after the agency accused the company of trying to cover up poor rural cell service with false rings. The settlement also requires the carrier to implement a “compliance plan” to address the issues. It was alleged that T-Mobile was using false ringtones to make it seem like someone just isn’t answering …
Climber safety and net neutrality FCC Commissioner provides an unexpected adios
Democratic FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn made a surprise announcement yesterday at the FCC’s open meeting– she’s resigning after serving a nine-year tenure at the agency. A fierce advocate of the FCC’s net neutrality rules, Clyburn has been at odds with Chairman Ajit Pai frequently. “I have enjoyed working with her and, even when we have not seen eye-to-eye on policy, I …
Feds charge FCC chairman’s advisory head Elizabeth Pierce with a $250 million fraud scheme
When Quintillion Subsea 0perations, LLC CEO Elizabeth Ann Pierce ran her first meeting of the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC) on April 21, 2017 as its newly appointed chairman, she echoed FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s message that it would be a priority of BDAC to remove regulatory barriers. She also knew, if the Department of Justice’s allegations are true, that …
Puerto Rico death is second industry tower tech fatality in April
A 28-year-old tower technician died Saturday after he was electrocuted while working on an AT&T LTE installation in Puerto Rico. According to sources knowledgeable of the incident, Josean Matos Rodriquez, employed by FM Technology Group of Dallas, Tex., was working on a residential rooftop when he came into contact with a 13kv power line. Authorities said the incident occurred at 10:50 …
Sprint and T-Mobile might believe the third time will be a charm
Sprint Corp has resumed talks to merge with T-Mobile US, according to Reuters, The Wall Street Journal and other news outlets who quoted unnamed sources. The third and fourth largest U.S. wireless carriers, with a combined subscriber base of almost 130 million customers, reportedly restarted talks, in part, to reduce operating network costs as well as share expansion costs. Shares …
FCC whacks Sprint & Mobilitie with a $11.6 million fine for non-compliant small cell installs
The Federal Communications Commission today announced settlements with Sprint and Mobilitie in two separate but related investigations into whether the companies completed proper tower registration as well as environmental and historic impact reviews prior to construction of wireless infrastructure facilities. The investigation was most likely initiated last April after Event Driven identified that Sprint appeared to have been complicit in providing …
It’s unlikely that company that stole 42 towers on paper will pay a $236K FCC fine
The FCC has proposed a penalty of $235,668 against Aura Holdings of Wisconsin, Inc. for the willful and repeated failure to provide truthful and accurate information to the Commission in submitting false and misleading information in 10 different change in ownership applications on the FCC’s antenna structure registration (ASR) website. Last June, Wireless Estimator broke the story of the FCC …
WIA’s Adelstein honored for wireless training and industry education work
Jonathan Adelstein, President and CEO of the Wireless Infrastructure Association (WIA), was honored today at the Wireless Connect conference held at the University of Maryland for his work to enhance training and education opportunities within the wireless infrastructure industry. Dr. Rikin Thakker, Faculty Member of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park, and …
Services set for Alabama tower tech, the nation’s first 2018 fatality
Services have been set for Melvin Ronnie Nelson, Jr., 34, a resident of Foley, Ala., who passed away Mon., April 2, while working on a new Verizon tower installation in Utica, Miss. Nelson was the first industry-related fatality in 2018. According to Hinds County Sheriff Major Pete Luke, “The tower was being erected just off Hwy. 27 near Bear Creek …
SpaceX’s broadband satellites approved conditioned upon not causing space collisions
The Federal Communications Commission issued an order approving SpaceX’s application to start launching operational satellites as early as 2019, with the goal of reaching the full capacity of over 4,000 satellites in 2024, even though the FCC approval only requires SpaceX to launch 50 percent of the satellites by March 2024, with the remainder by March 2027. “Grant of this …
New structural corset could sound the death knell for tower technicians’ retrofitting work
AT&T Labs’ top research scientists and engineers, in conjunction with Flex Tape for Towers, introduced a ground-breaking disruptive technology yesterday that is expected to transform the way capacity-challenged towers are retrofitted. It will also speed up broadband development and add to the towercos’ bottom lines, but will clearly force many companies specializing in structural rehabilitation to close their doors as …
Giant step back for mankind: Supreme Court scrubs Nokia’s 4G Moon network launch
Still smarting from last week’s passage of a rule by the FCC that will streamline the deployment of 5G networks by cutting into the ability of American Native Indian tribes to charge upfront usury fees for review of smaller cell sites throughout the country, tribes took solace in yesterday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision that scrubbed an effort – temporarily – …
