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Over a fifth of cell sites within areas impacted by Hurricane Helene reportedly out of service, according to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities
More than 20 percent of cell sites in areas impacted by Hurricane Helene remain out of service.
The Federal Communications Commission reported the findings in their recent Oct. 1 communications status report, which has been updated daily in the aftermath of Helene’s landfall.
The hurricane, which struck Florida at peak intensity as a Category 4 storm on Sept. 26, then brought torrential rains and severe flooding to inland portions of the US Southeast.
The storm resulted in an activation of the FCC’s Disaster Information Reporting System across areas in Florida, all of Georgia, all of South Carolina, and portions of Tennessee, North Carolina, and Virginia.
According to outage data submitted by providers in the affected areas, 21.7 percent of cell sites across areas impacted by Helene are experiencing outages.
That number represents a 9.1 percent rise in outages when compared with Monday’s communications status report.
Wireless service disruptions have been most severe in Florida and North Carolina, the report revealed.
In North Carolina, over 48 percent of cell sites within areas impacted by Helene were experiencing outages, representing a decline from 54 percent on Monday.
Meanwhile, in Florida, 36.7 percent of cell sites reported as being out of service as of Tuesday in areas Helene, the report stated.
The number of outages in Georgia areas also remained significant Tuesday, with nearly 22 percent of cell sites across the state experiencing outages.
Cell tower disruptions have been less severe in impacted areas of Tennessee, where over 12 percent of cell sites in impacted areas are out of service.
In South Carolina, a little over 7 percent of cell towers remained out of service Tuesday, and in Virginia, 3.5 percent of cell towers in impacted areas were experiencing disruptions.
This is a developing story. Stay tuned to BBCMag.com for updates.
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