Hey everyone, there was another injury this week. Wally Reardon posted this on Facebook and we are trying to gather more information. On county road 170 near county road 120 in Texas there was a man who fell about 100 feet from a utility tower and is alive! From what the article says his harness did catch him. The injured man’s name has not been released but his coworkers are Tyler Chavarria and John Vincon. Chavarria was also injured on the scene but did not require hospitalization. A helicopter came to take him to the hospital. His 2 workmates called for help. The injured man was flown to Corpus Christi Hospital. Thank GOD he was conscious when he was treated at the site. For more go to http://www.alicetx.com/news/20160414/one-man-injured-while-working-on-tower
A ComEd worker fell out of a cherry picker when a crane lifting a tower section in Forest Park, Il, dropped the section and it hit the power lines and the cherry picker bouncing the ComEd worker out of the cherry picker onto the ground causing him great injury. The accident happened at 16th and Circle Ave when the workers were putting up a cell tower with the ComEd worker up about 30 feet close to the tower work. For more go here, http://wgntv.com/2016/04/14/man-injured-in-electrical-work-accident/
I attended and spoke at the NEDAS show in New York City this year. What a great show! I got to hear the experts talk about new technology and real world problems. I was there for both days, attending all the sessions. Let me tell you, if you think that new technology will solve all the problems, then wake up. What you get from this is to hear what the people out in the field are really dealing with and some ideas to avoid the mistakes and problems that they have run into.
This was my opportunity to learn from the best. NYC is one of the toughest markets to do business and one that you should not tackle unless you talk to these people first. It will help you break into the other markets and learn what to do and what not to so.
I want to personally thank all the people that worked so hard at the show and thank them for having me speak. I want to thank Ilissa, Amy, Jennifer, and Nikki for working so hard to make this happen. They did an outstanding job to make this a fabulous event!
I got to attend the first day, April 5th, sessions that covered some great stuff. To me, a deployment guy hat installs DAS and small cell systems, I learned that a lot of people deal with the problems that I have seen. First off, shortcuts are great if they don’t cause you more problems. For instance, don’t forget to do the site survey of every floor when doing indoor DAS systems. Ed Donelan of Telecom Infrastructure Corp talked about how the site survey needs to be done properly and that you can’t take the word of the maintenance guy for what each floor is like. He mentioned how when one guy did a survey the landlord said all the floors were like the first one they looked at. What the landlord meant was the size and space. What the survey guy thought he meant was that there was a lowered ceiling on every floor. Needless to say, the ceilings on all the other floors were not lowered and it took the carrier years to properly run DAS through all of the floors because they had to find alternative routes. This was a real show stopper that took, the installation from taking months to taking years. A great lesson learned and the one thing that we need to so is plan ahead, measure twice cut once, however you want to look at it, the survey matters, a detailed survey. This is true in any aspect of wireless work.
Another talk was given by Tom Chamberlain of Westell. He brought up a real problem with indoor DAS called Near-Far. This problem arises when you have the outdoor signal bleeding into the indoor system and the device tries to lock onto it, making the device work harder and causing problems. This degrades performance and kills the battery. He showed real life examples of the problem and how Westell has a solution. It was a great representation of how to deal with problems that may be completely out of your control.
One of my favorite presentations was by Gerrard Carroll of Empirix, because they had the most amazing example of analytics that you could possibly use on any wireless systems. What it would do is take a sample of the system holistically. Why does this matter? If you have ever had to troubleshoot system problems, then you wouldn’t ask that question. There is no easy way to break it apart normally but now you can look at each segment of the network to identity a bottleneck or failure. What do you look for? Better question, what are you looking for? This package captures everything and you need to break out what you need to troubleshoot problems. that depends on what you want to see. The value this adds is immense because you can tell exactly where the problems could be in the system. If you have a throughput issue you can quickly determine whether it is on the backhaul, fronthaul, or over the air to the device. Don’t forget that some devices perform much better than others. We could learn if the DAS system is performing as it should be or if there is an issue elsewhere. It was a big data solution that will allow you to specify the specific analytics that you need, but it has the capability to collect everything, literally, on the system. I think this would be useful for any wireless system and I see great value in adding this. In fact, I spoke to people that want to investigate this solution. All I can say is, WOW!
Finally, for all of you fans of connecting through satellite, we a solution that Robin Gamble of Persistent Telecom had where he would be able to take the LTE system and cram it into one small box to avoid the problems you would have getting back to the core. This is an independent system that you could run a micro system in case you lose the connection to the core. He also had a satellite provider there to speak of how the satellite industry is putting amazing new birds into space with new antenna technology that will blow open the bandwidth that goes through them. It looks great and it is here now. They already can support LTE. They are also working with LEO satellite, not just the geo stationary birds to improve latency. It will be a game changer! I believe this may really help FirstNet and all remote providers here in North America, but they can cover the world! Really amazing stuff!
To get the picture you really had to be there, I recommend spending an extra day at these events where it is very intimate, you can talk to any of these people and get advice and guidance of how to move ahead through these common problems. Like when you readers asked me to write the Wireless Deployment Handbook for Small Cells, CRAN, and DAS, it was all about helping you avoid the mistakes that I have already made. Trust me, I made plenty.
Remember that they have many upcoming events, you can see them all at www.nedas.com, but to list a few, July 3rd they will be in Boston, September 21 they will be in Washington DC, and in October they will be in Toronto. Go to www.nedas.com to see them all. If you want to know more about small cells and DAS and learn from the best, I suggest attending these events!
Deploy with the Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS to show you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute without the mistakes.
I am so excited that the FCC will be releasing more spectrum for the rest of us. The Citizens Broadband Radio Service, (CBRS) here in the USA. I am not talking about the Billions of dollars that the US carriers need to spend to get LTE spectrum. I am talking about the spectrum that you can get just but filing and spending slightly less than a billion dollars. That’s right, the FCC will soon be releasing 150 MHz of 3.5GHz spectrum in the 3550 to 3700 MHz range. Oh boy, more spectrum that we can put LTE on, I mean you, the people that need it the most to create smaller wireless networks and possibly a carrier neutral system where they could roam onto. It would be LTE so the problems roaming from Wi-Fi to LTE would be resolved, can you believe it?
I know that some OEMs, like Ruckus, Nokia, and ip.access are pretty excited to sell some product in this area. I want to deploy in this area. Now all we need are UE devices with the spectrum in it. I am not too worried because that small company out of San Diego, Ca, is supporting it. You may know them as Qualcomm, I know them as one of my former employers. Not to mention Intel and Google love it! I see something big coming together. If the cable companies were smart, they would jump on the bandwagon now! There is also Federated Wireless who is planning to release something for this band.
However, let me explain some more detail.
It’s in the 3550 to 3700MHz range.
150 MHz of spectrum.
It is called Authorized Shared Access, (ASA) here in the USA and in Europe they are doing something similar called Licensed Shared Access, (LSA).
It is supported by Ruckus (recently bought by Brocade), ip.access, Google, Nokia, Qualcomm, and Intel.
Ruckus and ip.access already have products available.
It looks like a good model for neutral host solutions indoors.
Spectrum would be openly available with federal government getting first dibs and authorized access to the spectrum first.
Remember that the government has priority so if they use it then your listen before talk could shut you down.
3 tiered structure that has;
Tier 1 = Incumbents – the government who is already using it. Military radar on ships and ground. Fixed earth station receivers, and a few that already have broadband licenses. The broadband licensed people will be transitioned to Tier 2 and 3 in about 5 years.
Tier 2 = Priority access licenses – Licensed by auction for a 3-year term, 10MHz channel, in the 3550 to 3650MHz spectrum, could be used for offload, PTP, PMP, utility, enterprise broadband. (I see the carriers sucking this up, but who knows. I would say Google, but seriously, what have they paid for so far?)
Tier 3 = Generalized authorized access – new users with no interference protection. Minimum of 80MHz and maximum of 150MHz, 3550MHz to 3700MHz, licensed by rule, could be used for small cell, campus systems, offload, wireless broadband, or backhaul. (Get creative here. This is where we could make a small cell system, small companies that can’t afford to contribute billions to the FCC, you know, the small businesses who once could afford to get licenses and build wireless systems.)
So what is going on now? The FCC is working with a group to get input on SAS and ESC. What is that? Read below.
SAS = Spectrum Access System, they are looking at administrators and how it will be handled. SAS interface is still being worked out.
ESC = Environmental Sensing Capabilities, looking for operator applications.
YouTube athttps://youtu.be/Ypd9-IWg5hM which gives you an idea of what is going on. It is 68 minutes long, just a heads up. Meeting was on February 16th.
Purpose of the meeting was to review how to move ahead, even though it seems the standards are not finished.
Hosted by the Wireless Telecommunication Bureau (WTB) and Office of Engineering and Technology (OET) of the FCC.
At the meeting were players from Verizon, AT&T, Amdocs, Federated Wireless, CTIA, Google, Wireless Innovation Forum, Keybridge, ASRC Federal, Comsearch, and a few more. If Nokia was there, I didn’t hear them.
This may help decide who will be the SAS administrator and how it will be monitored. It will also help us understand how it will be coordinated and monitored. Remember that this has to be fair and balanced. (can it be with Google, AT&T, Verizon, and CTIA there, not sure that will happen.
So could this be the neutral host system that we’ve been waiting for? It’s licensed and we won’t have to worry about interference in the unlicensed band. Of course, there is the worry of government ships coming close to shore and the listen before talk causing problems.
If you build a system in this band then you, in theory, would not need to be anchored to a licensed band. You could build your own system on this, once there are devices for this band.
I really hope this succeeds, and I will tell you why. If we can get this going and growing then it should open up the doors to newer spectrum, more spectrum, then people like me could build a system that enterprise users could use. A way for the carriers to roam into a new area without licensed free, but with LTE in a lightly licensed solution that could let the device stay in LTE mode, just a different band. We may even be able to aggregate it someday.
Think of how many small cells that we could sell in this band! How much more we could expand systems? The WISPs and cable companies could build out the system in an area quickly. All we need are devices. This is something that they could really offer to the carriers for offloading, much better than Wi-Fi in my opinion because it would be lightly licensed.
Unfortunately, it may all rely on the carriers asking the device makers to add it to the devices. I believe that Qualcomm and Intel will make sure the chips have it and it gets in devices, but they will need the carriers buy in. We all know that the carriers are bullies when it comes to things like this. So if they say no, then what?
I see this as another stepping stone for 5G and densification. It will be another tool in the toolbox that we can use to improve coverage in a very clean way.
I am still trying to figure all of this out. I hope this band becomes the indoor standard or at least plays an integral part in the broadband ecosystem because it should mean more business for most of us. I hope it’s not another carrier dominated band that once again makes it harder for the smaller providers break into the market. I get it, Wi-Fi has potential, but wouldn’t it be nice if we could spend some money on spectrum to avoid 5 other hotspots stepping on us? Will the FCC allow it? Probably not if the largest carriers have their ears, which they seem to most of the time. Whether you love or hate T-Mobile, they seem to keep AT&T and Verizon Wireless in line. I don’t see T-Mobile making a play here, which is strange because they could use the spectrum. Not sure why they are conspicuously absent.
Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!
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The sessions at IWCE show were really great and I did go to many of them but I also moderated this session. I thought it would be good for you to see what is available for your site needs, especially if you are working mission critical operations. This is where the FirstNet system may or may not be up to par. I often wondered if FirstNet thought through their approach. Well, that’s another story, isn’t it?
Bob Selby-Wood, our favorite Australian, is the CEO and Founder of Sentor Control Systems, Inc, USA. He talked about monitoring the site for all the problems that they may see. He has had great success with the City of LA who rely heavily on his system to keep an eye on all problems in real-time. He covered how he would monitor the power before and after the filter because most customers don’t realize that they need to keep an eye on all aspects of their system. This was the one thing that most customers don’t monitor. The reason that is so important, filters won’t let you know if there is an antenna problem. By monitoring the forward and reflected power on both sides of the filter, in and out, you can see what is really happening on the antenna, if reflected rises, then you know you have a problem. If power drops on the outside of the filter, you may have a problems with the filter. You need to know what is really happening in your system.
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Rick Schmidtis the COO of Dantherm, Inc, of South Carolina. They make DC air conditioning units for sites. Rick covered how efficient the DC units can be for more reasons than just efficiency. He pointed out that the savings is really in how the unit can run steady at a lower speed for the compressor and the fans. This method saves so much energy by maintaining a constant speed versus the on-off-on-off scenario that pulls so much energy from normal cooling units. He also mentioned that the biggest mistake that most customers make is they try to cool the entire shelter more than necessary. You see, today’s equipment is hardened and can handle a higher temperature that you may believe. I know that cell site routers can handle more heat now than they could 3 years ago. Why not take advantage of that by saving on cooling costs and only cool what you need, like the cabinet, not the entire shelter. Just some suggestions. By the way, Rick is a really smart guy that has 2 patents, (he knows his stuff!)
John Potocki of PEPRO LLC covered the shelter design. He went over many different hardened sites and showed examples of different sites in extreme environments. They looked pretty wild, especially the Alaska site covered in snow, deep snow! When he was asked what the one over sight most customers make is, the answer was size! He talked about how most customers only look at the racks but they often overlook the filters, which usually are very large, but most customers don’t take that into consideration. This is a problem because a shelter is what it is, you can’t expand it mainly because it is hardened concrete. So what do you do? You plan ahead, look at all the equipment you will put in, and make sure that you plan for growth so you only put in one shelter, not 3 because you were too cheap up front to spring for a growth site. Most locations add equipment, very few remove equipment.
Nam Paik is the VP of Sales for TSi Power Corporation. He was there to speak of UPS systems and battery power. He gave a detailed presentation of how the systems work and what you need to look for when designing the system for appropriate backup power. I asked him what the one mistake most customers make, and he said that they often design systems for the max power needed, not the real world power draw. For example, if a unit is on 110VAC and has a 5A fuse or breaker, then you would know that the worst case power draw is 550 watts. The reality is that if you took an amp meter then you would see that the real draw is 1A. So at 110VAC at 1A the draw is 110W. So why buy a system that is 5 times bigger than you need? This is a common mistake that most people make and it adds unnecessary costs to your system. You may not think it’s a big deal, but 5 time the power means a bigger system and bigger batteries. If you have 100 sites, then it’s a real cost factor. By the way, Nam was nice enough to fill in at the last-minute, thank you Nam!
Site issues are often something that the site design team has to deal with. As you can see if you don’t do it right then you should expect problems from that site that will mean unnecessary site visits and probably outages. All because you didn’t plan properly up front. These are all critical issues, power, cooling, shelter, and monitoring it to know what is going on. Think about it!
Verizon’s Enterprise unit started a Value Added Distributor, VAD, program. Now, this has little to do with wireless at this time because it includes, “Verizon’s RRR service includes forensics, cyber incident assessments and designated security experts from Verizon who can go out to customer sites to conduct IT investigations 24/7.” Per the story at CRN.com found here.
Why do we care in wireless? I will tell you why I care! This is the type of program the carriers could setup for small cell deployments! Not outdoor, but the indoor small cell deployment. It’s funny because the wireless carriers want to expand indoor coverage but don’t want to pay for it. Customers want better and they are willing to pay for it. If a VAD could do it then they wouldn’t need to call Verizon and complain, instead they could call Verizon and ask for the nearest installation and integration team. Problems solved! I feel that the carriers demand complete control when this program would help them improve coverage for minimal costs.
Why is this so hard for all of the carriers to understand? I get it, plug and play on the small cells isn’t quite there yet, they may have problems with the neighbor list or cause self-interference or mess up a handoff. Well, figure it out, expand the network and have the customers pay for it. Honestly, what are you waiting for? T-Mobile already is giving away home small cells, why not let businesses install their own? They already paid for large DAS systems.
Think of how this would change the coverage, it would improve so quickly when a building owner would be able to install small cells to improve coverage for less than a full blow DAS system! I get it, do they?
T-Mobile made it clear that traditional DAS was too expensive, so here is the best cost-effective way to do it.
I know so many companies that want to sign up for this, and yet the carriers won’t offer it because they think that it may cause network problems. Well here is a model where they can control who the OEM is and provide a solution for their customers as well as bring more work to the contractors out there doing DAS and indoor coverage. It could expand into LTE-U and Wi-Fi. I see it as a game changer and a quick way to expand coverage as well as add customers. Let’s do this!
Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!
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I was in another session which was great if you work in public safety. It was session N259 – Pick Me, Pick Me! Choosing the Right Technology for Your System which was moderated by Steve Macke, a great moderator. He knew about all of these technologies, mostly because he consulted for people who needed help with almost all of them. Just a really smart guy in all things wireless.
I have to say, I was surrounded by greatness in this session. All of the speakers knew more about the evolution of communications that almost anyone I talked to. These guys certainly have seen it all. They knew about the progression of DMX, TETRA, P25, and all things 2 way all the way up to hardened communication systems to LTE. When you talk about LTE you understand that is has a long way to go make it reliable enough for public safety. I understand that but let’s face it, that is the end goal. It may be 5 to 10 years from now, but it is the future as I see it. While 5G is new and exciting, it will be built on and around LTE.
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So with all of that said, we need the PTT, (push to talk) systems as they are now. They are needed in public safety. They are normally in hardened sites. We really need to get LTE to that point. One thing that came up is that LTE is nowhere near the hardened requirements that public safety will need. In fact, the way FirstNet is building it out, it doesn’t look like it will be there for years to come, my opinion of course, but if they have a carrier build it, they will get a carrier class system, which is awesome. But, will it work after a hurricane or a tornado or a bombing? Ask yourself that. Now, let’s move on.
Doug Chapmanof Etherstack, representing PTIG in this session, talked about how P25 systems fit the current mission critical voice communications. Here is a smart guy that really understood what mission critical means and what they need to keep working.
Bill Frederickson of LMR Systems, Selex, representing DMRa, spoke of DMR systems being used as a cost-effective solution for voice communications.
Rodney Grim, National Technical Sales Manager of ICOM America, spoke about the use of NXDN and the service for real-time voice in critical communication. It is a very cost-effective voice solution for mission critical systems that has been around for year and is very reliable. It is commonly used in the USA.
John Monto, Director of Radio Technology Systems for Rockwell Collins/ARINC, spoke about TETRA systems being used not only worldwide, but here in the states today.
Dan O’Malley is a Sr Product Manager of Cisco, for the Internet of Things, gave a really interesting talk of a Cisco system that could work in mission critical systems that rely on the IP Network and the PTT system. He had examples of how the system could switch over from one call center to another in a mission critical situation.
Scott Peabody is a senior consultant for ADCOMM Engineering Company, gave a very technical and interesting talk of how 5G will be the critical infrastructure for the future. He demonstrated how the use of Wi-Fi in today’s world can solve some connectivity issues seen in our industry. He had an example of how he could connect a hip using Wi-Fi to provide them with over 100Mbps of data. Pretty cool stuff!
I spoke about using LTE in mission critical systems, well, really I laid out the pros and cons, because LTE isn’t there yet.
I will be on a round table talking about indoor antenna design at the Northeast DAS and Small Cell 2016 Spring In Building Summitin New York City on April 6th, 2016. It is being put together by NEDAS. I am looking at it from a deployment perspective. Remember that in building installations have to be quick, efficient, and look really nice. The antenna has to work properly so that your design matches your test.
On the round table I will be joined by Anritsu and Spidercloud. We will all be talking about Developments in Mobile Antenna Technology. Mike Sapien of Ovum will be the moderator.
The team that is pulling this together is doing a great job and I would like to thank them for inviting me to go.
Just wanted to let you all know that the summit is happening next week. I have been so busy I didn’t get to talk about it much.
This is a great opportunity to learn more about DAS and small cell design for in building. Think of the growth that we expect to see. Between DAS and small cells we will really be taking off to densify the coverage in building and outside.
Deploy with the Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS to show you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute without the mistakes.
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I got back from IWCE 2016 exhausted. There was so much going on at that show that I can’t begin to tell you everything. So what I will go over is what I was able to attend.
Mary Walshof LBC Consultants and Services moderated the session and did a great job of introducing us all and moderating.
I was on the stage withWim Brouwer of Nokia who spoke of Wi-Fi and how it could be leveraged to maximize LTE coverage. Wim spoke of how Wi-Fi can be used to extend the connection of your device back into the core. How now Wi-Fi does not have to have a specific SSID to connect to the core, but the device would connect through the Wi-Fi to the core. The way I understood it was that the Wi-Fi was merely a pipe to the internet that could connect to the core.
Patrik Ringqvist, the VP and CTO of Industry and Society for Ericsson spoke about LTE and the progression into 5G. His presentation spoke of the roadmap of VoLTE being ready for services and 5G will use LTE as the foundation to build the newer 5G network.
Dan O’Malleya senior product manager of Cisco gave his talk on what is broadband. While he gave a strong Cisco position it was very interesting. He was able to show us the LTE options and how the broadband system was not only the RAN, but the applications all the way to the core. It was really quite interesting.
Sami Honkaniemi, the managing director or the Mentura Group, gave a great talk on how hybrid systems of the current PTT and LTE systems can co-exist and work together now. This was showing how for mission critical system the LTE would have to have solutions to bridge the open gap between your data on LTE and your mission critical voice on your PTT system which could be DMX, TETRA, P25, or anything else. It looked really cool!
Deploy with the Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS to show you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute without the mistakes.
Mohan Tammisetti, the CTO and Co-Founder of Virtualcomm, and Gary Monetti, founder and managing director of Monetti and Associates, talked about how the LTE systems can be expanded by using a small interface and a LTE hotspot for emergency situations. This small LTE system extender was really a hit and something that people are interested in because you can expand the network in a crisis situation with little effort! (If the FAA would allow it, which by todays rules, they don’t.) Then you could launch a drone with the hotspot and connect back to the mini core with either Wi-Fi or a back channel, and use that for the first responders on site. If only the FAA could clear up the drone rules for business and emergency use.
Mohan Tammisettiwas planning to do a demo later that evening. I would have loved to have seen the demo but I could not make it. They were going to show the connectivity of the LTE through their tiny core and the hotspot. It was a proof of concept.
I went over the actual LTE Wireless deployment. This was the session that I thought would really highlight what the deployment teams do for LTE. Remember, without the deployment teams, RF Design, installers, tower climbers, optimization teams, site acquisition teams, and all the people that put the system out there, not of the above systems will work. They mean nothing if you keep them in a lab, when they are deployed, that is when they make money!
I was able to absorb quite a bit of information, don’t be afraid to click here to see all of my IWCE 2016 sessions.
I hope that sums it up for you!
Remember, be smart, be safe, and pay attention!
To report an emergency, fatality, or imminent life threatening situation please contact OSHA’s toll-free number immediately: 1-800-321-OSHA (6742)
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Here is a story of not only a survivor, but an inspiration of someone who truly feels he is blessed from GOD and someone who really inspires by his great attitude and his love of his family. I have to tell you if you don’t have faith before this, you will after you listen.
First, some background. If you want to read about the accidentwhen it happened follow this linkto read about when it happened. His wife was quick to set up a GoFundMe account, found here, that helped the family through this very difficult time. His accident happened on September 23rd, 2015, which caused him to be flown to one hospital, then to another. He survived and he tells us how he is doing.
Deploy with the Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS to show you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute without the mistakes.
In this interview he talks about how he was shocked by over 20,000 volts of electricity from some electrical lines next to the residential tower he was working on. He not only recovered but he is working again. He will never climb again because he lost his lower right leg, but the way this guy is pushing forward is amazing. John is more than a survivor, he is inspirational!
He is so thankful to be where he is. He doesn’t feel sorry for himself like so many people would. He is moving on and being thankful for his family and all this who helped him.
We talk about his wife who was so amazing to not only stand by him, stayed with him in the hospital, but got the funds to keep them moving forward. She did so much for him and when he talks about it I was moved by the love this woman had.
Another thing that he talks about is how GoFundMe really helped them through this. How the Hubble Foundationand the Tower Family Foundationdid so much to help them through this situation. These 2 foundations really stepped up and did all that they could to support the family. They didn’t ask for anything in return, the only asked how they could help this family. They worked with Elaina, (John’s wife) to help her anyway they could.
I want to point out a few things, John could sit around and feel sorry for himself, he didn’t and he doesn’t. He is moving ahead with such faith it really moves me. His wife Elaina is an amazing person to support him this way, she is an amazing woman.
The support that the GoFundMe donors is moving. The support that the two outstanding foundations, the Hubble Foundationand the Tower Family Foundationdeserve so much credit here to support the family this way. I want to make sure that people know these foundations are out there to support climbers and their families in need at a time of devastation.
I would like to note that Dr. Bridgette Hester and Mr. Ben Little are 2 of the best people I know. The passion that these 2 have to help people in need in this industry is amazing. I would like to thank them for all that they have done and continue to do for all of us. Their passion inspires me and should inspire all of us to help others without expecting anything in return.
Finally, let me say that Surf Air Wireless is an amazing company. They supported John throughout the entire process and he still works there today. How amazing is that? He works for them in the dock and they really are supportive of his recovery. They are doing what they can to keep him going. WOW! Surf Air Wirelessis a great WISP in my book. You will hear what he says in the interview.
To report an emergency, fatality, or imminent life threatening situation please contact OSHA’s toll-free number immediately: 1-800-321-OSHA (6742)
I really think that John is an inspiration to humans in general with his faith and great attitude. He has been through so much, yet he doesn’t whine or complain, he remains positive and keeps moving forward. He is truly an inspiration to all of us. Look what we have! We have our health, we have both legs, and we can go to work tomorrow without wearing a prosthetic leg, and yet we complain about our problems. They don’t’ seem so important now, do they. I recommend taking the time to listen what he has to say.
By the way, John wanted me to make sure that I mention his brother, Joel, who called 911 and stayed on the tower with him for almost an hour until the medics arrived to get him down and to the hospital. He literally owes Joel his life and they work together. How great is that?!? They got John down with a bucket truck and Joel was there to assist.
If you want to hear more from Elaina and John, their blog is at http://samelovenewlife.blogspot.com/and she will keep you up to date. I plan to talk to Elaina in the near future.
Keep the faith, be smart, be safe, and pay attention!
GOD bless John and all the people who helped them.
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I have an official statement from John “JD” Ledcke ofPinpoint Services.
“The information provided by Curtis Walton in this interview is inaccurate, and your summary of the interview embellishes Curtis’s false comments. Your statement that there was no rescue gear available and that it was a “poorly prepared crew” is completely false. There was a complete rescue kit, including a descend rope, on site and offered to Stephen Crabtree at the time of the accident. Stephen’s statement in his interview that there was a rescue rope and that a rescue was immediately offered to him contradicts your statement that there was no gear at all. Additionally, both Stephen and Curtis had just successfully completed a three-day training session prior to this job. Stephen’s employment was not terminated the night of this incident, as Curtis alleged. Also, neither Curtis’ termination nor that of the job foreman were related to Stephen’s accident in any way. I will not violate our former employees’ privacy by recounting the true reasons for their terminations, but I ask that you not continue to publish statements that you know to be false. Further, Curtis’s allegation that he was stranded by his employer was not related to Pinpoint, and your story fails to make this clear. Both Mike Craven’s comments and the contradictions between Curtis and Stephen’s stories about the weather conditions and rescue equipment should have apprised you of the fact that their stories required further investigation or were not suitable for publication. You repeated false statements of these individuals and also made your own false statements that were not actually said by Curtis or Stephen. Pinpoint will not further publicly respond regarding this matter, due to the concern that you will not accurately summarize statements of the Company. Please correct the false, inflammatory statements against Pinpoint or simply remove these articles from your blog.”
I recently got a call from Steven Crabtree, who is injured in a tower accident who is now on disability. He was willing to talk about it, which I really appreciate. I have the full interview on my podcast, so for all the details go there. I did ask him questions and he answered in his word, not mine. Remember that we are only hearing one side of the story, and I don’t have anyone to confirm or deny what happened. As in most cases, most people cower and shy away from telling anyone outside of their circles anything for fear of being blacklisted in the industry. Most people are scared or there may be a lawsuit. Most companies just want this to go away.
What a shame, all those cowards only thinking of themselves, isn’t it? When we could learn from things like this! We could learn from near miss stories. But, as usual in the tower industry, everyone is too scared to help others, to teach, to learn, while instead they all cower away and say, “It’s not my fault!” Well, here Stephen readily admits he was in over his head, but he did it anyway. He also wanted to learn from it, but instead his company put him on indefinite leave. While I don’t know their story, yet, they obviously want to protect themselves and they already have someone to blame. I would love to hear what Black and Veatch thinks. They had someone on site along with the crane operator and with Pinpoint.
Remember, I am taking this at face value. I am reaching out to other contacts for verification. It seems that the crew he was working with was let go, according to Stephen. I have no verification on that.
To sum it up, he was injured on a tower where his shoulder and knee had damage. His crew didn’t have the rescue gear to pull him down so he had to climb down without help only to pass out when he touched the ground. He then had an ordeal going through workman’s comp and the hospital thought he wasn’t hurt too back but he had to go to another hospital and now he needs surgery. He is getting workmen’s comp, but his company is putting him on permanent leave. All this because he was in over his head for this particular job. This all happened back in January 26th, 2016 from what he said.
What would you do?
So here is something to think about. When you listen to Mr. Crabtree talk then you realize he lays some the blame on himself for getting in over his head. He also mentions how the crane operator knew that there would be problem by just looking at the site, when he said you need a winch, not a crane. There were warning signal but yet he moved ahead anyway, the whole crew did. There was a competent rigger on site that said it could be done, yet he remained on the ground. Also, There was a Black and Veatch guy there as well for safety. All of these people, and now Mr. Crabtree is out of work living on disability.
One thing that you hear in this interview is that he really loves climbing and he wants his reputation to remain intact. Unfortunately, after something like this, he may never climb again.
I would bet all of you will say it won’t happen to me, after all, you would know better. And yet, when I talk to Dr. Bridgette Hester of the Hubble Foundation, she tells me that her research shows almost all of you do stupid things, knowing it’s stupid, anyway. I know I have! I did too many things that I probably shouldn’t have. You know how I learned? I did them and came up with a better way to do them. I would ask older and more experienced climbers what they would do. I would reach out for help, even to the competition. They would laugh and get mad but in the end they would help because they didn’t want anyone to get hurt. Unfortunately most of those guys are starting to retire. Business isn’t exactly booming so why stick with it. We are losing our resources full of experience.
Remember that I only have one side of the story, so there may be more. Stephen was also put on indefinite leave and no longer has insurance, so he is quite upset with Pinpoint. He will have a hard time getting by and chances are good he will lose his house. He does have a GoFundMe account,https://www.gofundme.com/agn6hz38that you can donate to if you would like.
Stephen is having problems trying to get support for his doctor and is trying to work through the injury and move ahead. It’s hard when you can’t work. His hand has the shakes all the time.
He did reach out to Hubble Foundation for help, and they will help if he has proof of hardship. They did offer to work with him and they are vetting the story. Unfortunately many people have lied to the Hubble Foundationin the past for a quick buck, yes, there are dirt bags in this business. I will write about this people in another post.
I think maybe we need to ask NATE to provide a resource, a hotline, where climbers could call for help! Maybe NATE could refer them to the proper ANSI document. I do remember at the FCC/OSHA safety workshop that Craig Lekutis of Wireless Estimator said that all climber should read TIA-222G, which I just opened in PDF form, all 262 pages of my copy. Have I read it? Not all of it, I use it more as a reference, shouldn’t we all. It may have helped in this situation, maybe the authorized rigger on site read it. Let’s look at page 114, where my older copy describes an “Authorized (Basic) climber”, and I quote, “an individual with the physical capabilities to climb who may or may not have previous climbing experience but has training in fall protection regulations, the equipment that applies to the field including instruction for their proper use; able to climb designated fixed access routes equipped with safety climb devices.” In all honesty Craig is right, it should be required reading, yet so few probably even know it exists.
You know what I wish? I wish we would learn from these near misses, I wish we would record them and report them, instead of brushing them under the rug. If you dare you can tell your near miss stories on a Facebook Group I created, https://www.facebook.com/groups/434898530040536/ for people who want to learn. You could email me at wade4wireless@gmail.com to tell me and keep it hush-hush. We need a way to learn from them. Don’t forget all of OSHA’s has a website to report complaints, found here, that you could let them know what’s going on.
We could change the industry for the better, instead, we choose to cover up the near miss incidents when we could learn so much. The more things change, the more they remain the same. Let’s make change! Let’s improve the industry by making a case book of these incidents and working to eliminate the hazards and the risks as much as we can. However, if we stay on this path we can hope for the best and continue see companies lay blame because it’s easier and it looks better to the insurance company when we just turn our backs on the people who work hard to grow the company. Will these companies continue to screw the little guy? Many companies will and they always will.
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Remember that OSHA is working hard to keep your job safe!
there was a man who fell about 100 feet from a utility tower and is alive! From what the article says his harness did catch him. The injured man’s name has not been released but his coworkers are Tyler Chavarria and John Vincon. Chavarria was also injured on the scene but did not require hospitalization. A helicopter came to take him to the hospital. His 2 workmates called for help. The injured man was flown to Corpus Christi Hospital. Thank GOD he was conscious when he was treated at the site. For more go to http://www.alicetx.com/news/20160414/one-man-injured-while-working-on-tower
