AT&T and T-Mobile enable roaming after Hurricane Sandy Causes Cellular Outages
Hurricane Sandy has caused massive destruction to cellular service and wired Internet, TV, and phone services in addition to knocking out the New York City data centers out of service, Sandy, a tropical cyclone that severely affected portions of thurricane-sandyhe Caribbean, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States the largest Atlantic hurricane on record, with winds spanning 1,100 miles and a damage of at least $20 billion being left in its wake, with estimates of losses caused by business interruptions expected to rise beyond $50 billion, With all major service providers such as AT&T, Verizon Wireless, T-Mobile, and Sprint acknowledging cellular outages.
AT&T released a statement stating: “As we continue to closely monitor our wireline and wireless networks for service disruptions, we are experiencing some issues in areas heavily impacted by the storm. We are in the initial stages of performing an on-the-ground assessment of our network for damage, and crews will be working around the clock to restore service. We are deploying personnel and equipment as soon as it is safe to do so.”
T-Mobile acknowledged that its “customers may be experiencing service disruptions or an inability to access service in some areas, especially those that were hardest hit by the storm.”
Verizon Wireless noted on Tuesday afternoon its customers may be experiencing service issues and that about 94 percent of its cell sites were up and running. Also indicating that its non-wireless services receiving the brunt of the destruction, “The storm surge from Hurricane Sandy has resulted in flooding at several Verizon Central Offices in Lower Manhattan, Queens, and Long Island causing power failures and rendering back-up power systems at these sites inoperable,” Verizon further noted that. “While these sites are currently on battery power, the inevitable loss of power requires that all equipment at these sites be powered down to prevent damage. Customers that are served by these central offices will experience a loss of all services including FiOS (voice, Internet, video), high speed Internet, and telephone services. Some customers may experience intermittent busy signals while attempting to dial 311 service for non-emergency calls.”
To the relief of most customers of AT&T and T-Mobile, the two service providers have agreed to enable roaming on their networks to customers of both companies in the heavily impacted areas of New York and New Jersey Sates and where capacity is available and for subscribers with a compatible device. With their subscribers being able to make their calls to call their loved ones as they normally would but their calls being carried by whichever network is operational at the time of making the call. This will be a seamless transition for their customers with no extra charges being levied or any stipulations required for the transition from one provider’s network to the other.