Phones of yesteryear were an analog twisted pair to the Central Office. The CO could be miles away, but DSL only works for a mile or two over twisted pair.
When The digital revolution came, the phone companies ran trunk lines or fiber from the CO to a Subscriber Line Interface Concentrator, then twisted pair from the SLIC to the home. The SLIC requires power, but often has battery backup for 24 to 72 hours. After that generator power is required. The phone company (Southern Bell -> Bellsouth -> AT&T) was pretty good about bringing out a generator truck when needed.....unlike Comcast who left us without TV and internet for 7 weeks, but had no problem sending us a bill for the non service.
My house in Florida was built in 1977, and had a twisted pair from the house to the CO. Somewhere in the 80's the phone company installed a giant underground vault on a main road where three neighborhoods intersected. This area was about 1/2 mile from the swamp (Florida Everglades) and had a flood control canal on one side....brilliant move.
The previously posted pictures of our flooded neighborhood were not the only time it happened. The streets were covered in water deep enough to take a canoe or jet ski through at least 10 times in the 37 years I lived there. That underground vault was flooded over at least that many times, but its ventilation system was a few feet above ground. There were a few times where that wasn't enough. No phone for days.
I had never upgraded my phone to "digital service" since that came at a higher price. That turned out to be a good move. As long as the CO had power, I had a phone line. This still required an old style phone that didn't require power. I told the neighbors that they could use my cordless phone any time that heard my generator running. I didn't want everybody tracking mud into the house to get to the corded phone. Sometimes we had a dozen people waiting to use the phone.
When The digital revolution came, the phone companies ran trunk lines or fiber from the CO to a Subscriber Line Interface Concentrator, then twisted pair from the SLIC to the home. The SLIC requires power, but often has battery backup for 24 to 72 hours. After that generator power is required. The phone company (Southern Bell -> Bellsouth -> AT&T) was pretty good about bringing out a generator truck when needed.....unlike Comcast who left us without TV and internet for 7 weeks, but had no problem sending us a bill for the non service.
My house in Florida was built in 1977, and had a twisted pair from the house to the CO. Somewhere in the 80's the phone company installed a giant underground vault on a main road where three neighborhoods intersected. This area was about 1/2 mile from the swamp (Florida Everglades) and had a flood control canal on one side....brilliant move.
The previously posted pictures of our flooded neighborhood were not the only time it happened. The streets were covered in water deep enough to take a canoe or jet ski through at least 10 times in the 37 years I lived there. That underground vault was flooded over at least that many times, but its ventilation system was a few feet above ground. There were a few times where that wasn't enough. No phone for days.
I had never upgraded my phone to "digital service" since that came at a higher price. That turned out to be a good move. As long as the CO had power, I had a phone line. This still required an old style phone that didn't require power. I told the neighbors that they could use my cordless phone any time that heard my generator running. I didn't want everybody tracking mud into the house to get to the corded phone. Sometimes we had a dozen people waiting to use the phone.
> I didn't want everybody tracking mud into the house to get to the corded phone.
Hang a dumbphone on the meter pole (outside demarc) like I do.
Our connection has been out 8 times in 2 months. Each time they insist I check at the demark before they will come. I've had a cord-phone hung on the pole with a milk-jug raincap out there for days at a time. I could make it a public convenience. Except the "long distance" fees around here are arbitrary and high.
Hang a dumbphone on the meter pole (outside demarc) like I do.
Our connection has been out 8 times in 2 months. Each time they insist I check at the demark before they will come. I've had a cord-phone hung on the pole with a milk-jug raincap out there for days at a time. I could make it a public convenience. Except the "long distance" fees around here are arbitrary and high.
The area where we lived had already degraded to a near combat zone before hurricane Wilma. I wasn't about to leave an unsupervised phone available to people that I didn't know at all. There are too many people from the Caribbean Islands that would call home on my dime.
Wilma ripped the roofs off of about 50% of the houses in that neighborhood, mostly due to shoddy construction and poor maintenance of a 30 year old home. This was at the peak of the housing insanity where people paid over $300K for a house that originally sold for $35K. Once the hurricane trashed the place the property values dropped into the low $100K range, so all the people who were upside down in their loans walked. When half the houses on your block are empty, bad stuff happens.....especially when the word gets out that they have copper plumbing and wiring.
So, WTF is going on kids?
Humberto just passed over Bermuda - much lower sustained winds, but still hella mess to clean up. A lot of their electrical distribution is still old school above ground, so they usually get power outages (80% or so). Fortunately no loss of life yet reported. The major concern for travellers is the antiquated causeway to the airport.
Imelda just left a bit of a mess in the Gulf Coast area - up to 40 inches of rain
Jerry bearing down along a similar path to Dorian?
But wait, there’s more:
6 named hurricanes at the same time - “not something you can fix with a Sharpie, sir”
Humberto just passed over Bermuda - much lower sustained winds, but still hella mess to clean up. A lot of their electrical distribution is still old school above ground, so they usually get power outages (80% or so). Fortunately no loss of life yet reported. The major concern for travellers is the antiquated causeway to the airport.
Imelda just left a bit of a mess in the Gulf Coast area - up to 40 inches of rain
Jerry bearing down along a similar path to Dorian?
But wait, there’s more:
6 named hurricanes at the same time - “not something you can fix with a Sharpie, sir”
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I was wondering how Nova Scotia was getting on. Still pulling lawnchairs out of coconut trees? Or are some folks cold and dark still?
The official Nova-Power site says about 70 customers out today, which could be lingering repair or just "normal day". (Emira Maine is mildly smaller and claims "No outages found".)
I said our phone long-distance rates are arbitrary. A call in-state can be $2/min. But today's bill shows 1min to Ft Meyers Fla, $0.12! We don't know nobody in Ft Meyers! And the date suggests one of the 8 times we had a tech to/near the house. Did he call his girlfriend? Then why only a minute? (The company does have offices in Fla.)
The official Nova-Power site says about 70 customers out today, which could be lingering repair or just "normal day". (Emira Maine is mildly smaller and claims "No outages found".)
I said our phone long-distance rates are arbitrary. A call in-state can be $2/min. But today's bill shows 1min to Ft Meyers Fla, $0.12! We don't know nobody in Ft Meyers! And the date suggests one of the 8 times we had a tech to/near the house. Did he call his girlfriend? Then why only a minute? (The company does have offices in Fla.)
NS is limping along, some folks in rural areas still do not have power. Most of the uprooted trees in Halifax have been cut up and removed, and the "erupted" sidewalks (where tree roots turned pavements nearly vertical) have either been repaired or filled in with gravel awaiting repaving. I am not aware of any power issues remaining in the city, although that collapsed crane has been declared a "localized state of emergency" and folks are still evacuated from surrounding buildings.
My parents live in rural NS and just got their power back on the weekend. I work in downtown Halifax and most things are running smoothly now but there are still a lot of downed trees that need to be cleaned up. There was a major fail of a construction crane which collapsed and fell onto and over a building that was under construction. Luckily it did not go in the other direction and hit an occupied high end condo building. The counterweight and the control station of the crane are still on the building with the collapsed lifting boom draped over the side all the way down to the street. It’s a major engineering exercise to get it off the building safely. Since it could fall at any moment the whole block has been evacuated, businesses, condos and all. The contractors and engineers hired to get this mess cleaned up were having trouble getting insurance so the province stepped in and declared a local state of emergency which transfers the indemnity to the province. This will allow work to commence right away. It will still be weeks before the mess is cleaned up. The top 2 floors of the building have been “compromised” by the impact. That damage will need assessment and remediation before the construction can get back on track. Those cranes are in such demand here that there may be a considerable delay before one can be found to take over the job. Anyone want to take a guess at what it will cost to completely clean up this mess. I’m thinking it could run into 7 figures.
I took a picture from my office window
I took a picture from my office window
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Two mobile mega cranes. Remove the counterweights then attach either side of the buckle. cut the boom in two and lower the pieces. Done by sundown.
The building is another story but that's why they design the hammerhead cranes the way they do. Strong for handling live loads and lightweight (truss booms) so they are less damaging when they topple. Hopefully they won't have to demolish those two floors.
Nice to hear the cranes are in high demand. A booming economy is a good thing.
Thanks for the pic.
You'd have to have been living in a hole not to have seen this vid. It was posted soon after the crane toppled, and everyone was following the news as Dorian came ashore. Trust me.
Watch the moment the crane collapsed in Halifax | CTV News Atlantic
The building is another story but that's why they design the hammerhead cranes the way they do. Strong for handling live loads and lightweight (truss booms) so they are less damaging when they topple. Hopefully they won't have to demolish those two floors.
Nice to hear the cranes are in high demand. A booming economy is a good thing.
Thanks for the pic.
You'd have to have been living in a hole not to have seen this vid. It was posted soon after the crane toppled, and everyone was following the news as Dorian came ashore. Trust me.
Watch the moment the crane collapsed in Halifax | CTV News Atlantic
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Saw the video. Cal, apparently they need to bring in 3 cranes to get the job done. They hired a specialty engineering firm from Ontario to figure out how to do it safely. Right now Halifax is booming. This particular area is downtown south end prime real estate, near the universities and hospitals. There are 4 of those cranes within a couple of blocks.
It will be interesting to see if they can figure out the cause and if anything new is learned that can prevent this sort of accident from happening again.
It will be interesting to see if they can figure out the cause and if anything new is learned that can prevent this sort of accident from happening again.
I know you saw the vid, probably more than 20 times by now, I was actually telling you that half the world saw that vid. When cranes come down on camera, that's big news no matter where you live. So are hurricanes.
No, I don't think we're going to see a change in design. To me it's like big rig tires. My Mother once asked me why they blow out and why can't they make them stronger? I explained they are like a safety valve. Make them stronger and if you do have a blowout you could kill the persons in the car next to the truck. Somethings have to be made a certain way for safety reasons even though it seems counterintuitive.
The truss system for cranes is tried and true and there are just some things you can't overcome without risking something else, possibly much more disastrous than a crane falling and buckling over a building.
No, I don't think we're going to see a change in design. To me it's like big rig tires. My Mother once asked me why they blow out and why can't they make them stronger? I explained they are like a safety valve. Make them stronger and if you do have a blowout you could kill the persons in the car next to the truck. Somethings have to be made a certain way for safety reasons even though it seems counterintuitive.
The truss system for cranes is tried and true and there are just some things you can't overcome without risking something else, possibly much more disastrous than a crane falling and buckling over a building.
Why do we have two Humberto's in 12 years? In English alone the H's have many. Mind you, some of them might have origins elsewhere, but who cares, they're all names we know. Including Mr. KFC. (except they forgot the d at the end)
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I wasn’t thinking that the accident was the result of the crane design, which as you note is a mature and well understood practice, but more likely a poor implementation or operational error in the unique circumstances of a hurricane in this particular location.
After all, 3 other cranes nearby survived unscathed.
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