A New Spate of Deaths In the Wireless Industry 247
onehitwonder writes "The race to build out advanced cellphone networks in the U.S. has contributed to a spike in deaths among tower workers, making this one of the industry's deadliest years and drawing fresh scrutiny from federal regulators, according to The Wall Street Journal. At least 10 workers have died in falls from communication towers so far this year, and three more were seriously injured. The accidents, nine of which were related to cellphone network work, come during one of the biggest building booms in years, as Sprint Corp. and T-Mobile US Inc. ramp up major network upgrades in an attempt to catch up with Verizon Wireless and AT&T Inc."
I really don't get it (Score:4, Insightful)
How do you forget to clip on? Even after a decade working in the job how could you possibly forget? It's like forgetting to wait for the cross signal and just walking out into traffic.
Re:What the fudge.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Because every life is precious.
Re:I really don't get it (Score:5, Insightful)
How do you forget to clip on?.
"working 12- or 16-hour days"
"haven't taken days off in weeks"
Exhaustion results in errors.
Re:What the fudge.. (Score:4, Insightful)
So every one in one thousand dies on the job. I'd say that's a pretty high mortality rate for the US.
It's a sad mess out there for the crews... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a former tower climber / tower climbing instructor and engineering manager in the wireless internet and cellular industries I can tell you that the big cellular companies do push hard to crank out new sites or upgrades to existing sites, but it's ultimately up to the climbers / installers and site foreman to insure that safety standards are followed and gear is inspected and used properly. It's hard to read about all these deaths and injuries knowing that - as with many things - these things can be avoided. When properly trained and equipped, tower climbing is remarkably safe, there are systems and backup systems to keep you on the tower should something go wrong. More often than not climbers will free climb or not utilize a 100% tie-off system, meaning even while moving, you're clipped in 100% of the time, even if it slows you down to move from one part of a tower to another. I was climbing up until September of last year and my climbing partner and I inspected everything we used and all the safety gear on the tower as we ascended. We also checked each other front and back to make sure we were not forgetting a strap or a ring or something before climbing.
One of the amazing things about the cellular industry that I noticed (I did cell networks for about 9 years all over the USA and 2 years of wireless business internet in the PacNW) is that the cell companies will outfit a million dollar site with radio gear and amplifiers and the latest and greatest connectivity they can get there, and then 6-12 months later come out and rip it all out and upgrade it again. They then resell the old gear to other providers here in the US or abroad, ie third world countries etc. This breakneck pace puts a lot of pressure on tower crews to crank out sites fast, adding to the safety issues. All to make a buck, the good ol' American way...
Re:We're from OSHA (Score:0, Insightful)
How to scare a republican:
How to get a republican to cream their pants:
Re:Tie off (Score:4, Insightful)
I am willing to bet even with all the rules and regulations in the world, there will be 10 deaths a year due to 10 guys who think they are super men, and doesn't need that safety equipment and will do their job without it, no matter how much it is enforced.
Re:Safety harness... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:We're from OSHA (Score:5, Insightful)
Solution? Don't contract for AT&T. Can't survive otherwise? Maybe you shouldn't be in that business, then.
Re:We're from OSHA (Score:2, Insightful)
Danger: "Magic of the market" thinking detected.
This is a bit like saying "Don't like Windows? Don't work with Microsoft". AKA, not an option in the vast majority of the business world.
To put it another way, you don't technically need a car. This is true on the face of it, but in reality, without a car you better live downtown if you want to not be late to work every day.
Re:What the fudge.. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not exactly a huge shockwave out of the 313 Million people in America.. wondering why this story even made it here.
Because a person shouldn't have to take completely unnecessary risks in order to make a living, all so that a major publicly traded company can save a few bucks.
Re:Tie off (Score:4, Insightful)
In the electrical industry those guys are not only fired, but fired with the union's blessing.
Re:That's why you should use wired networks (Score:5, Insightful)
> where they were smart enough to do a cost-benefit analysis and realized that underground wiring only resulted in 50% fewer outages,
> while costing 4 to 6 times as much to install and repair.
As opposed to countries where they went a step further & decided that the higher cost of underground wiring was pocket change compared to the impact of service outages?
It's like electricity. From the perspective of end users who need power during anything short of an extinction-level asteroid impact event, it's almost always going to be cheaper to pay the marginal cost of buried infrastructure and hardened generation sites than it is to personally build and maintain their own parallel on-site power generation capabilities. My normal electric bills are ~$180/month. If FPL charged me 2% month more to pay for amortizing the cost of burying the neighborhood power lines out over 25 years, my bills would increase by approximately $43/year. Compare that to the cost of buying even a shit generator that's big enough to wheeze and limp while powering an air conditioner & a few hundred watts of battery chargers & lights. Add in the $35-50/day worth of gasoline it takes to keep it running at 50% load all day during the outage, and even a 10% surcharge starts to look cheap, if only because the net reliability ends up being almost the same, with a lot less individual hassle.
And yes, I said $35-50/day. A typical 5600-watt generator has a 5 gallon tank, and can run for about 8-10 hours at 50% load. $3.50/gallon x 5 gallons/tank x 2.5 tanks/day = $43.75. Add up the total for 2 weeks without power after a hurricane, and you're looking at one HELL of an expensive power bill for the month ($612.50 for 14 days). Balance that against the likelihood of having about 4 weeks of cumulative power outages per decade against the relatively long service life of buried power lines, and buried infrastructure starts to look like an *incredibly* good bargain.