The FCC granted a waiver to American Electric Power from requirements for quarterly antenna lighting inspections. The agency says this should prompt more tower owners to adopt self-diagnostic lighting systems.
Systems that monitor tower lighting must be inspected at intervals “not to exceed” three months, according to FCC rules, to ensure they’re working. However, Section 17.47(c) exempts towers that are monitored by a system the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau “has determined includes self-diagnostic features sufficient to render quarterly inspections unnecessary,” according to the agency.
AEP provides monitoring for its affiliates and subsidiaries, currently in 375 sites across the United States. AEP asked the Commission to find that the American Electric Power Service Corporation Monitoring System (AEPMS) satisfies the criteria for the exception.
Specifically, AEP wanted the FCC to determine that the self-diagnostic functions of its monitoring system are “sufficiently robust to ensure that the control devices, indicators, and alarm systems on antenna structures using the AEPMS are operating properly, such that quarterly inspections are unnecessary,” notes the agency.
AEP told the agency that its system provides the functional equivalent of a continuous inspection of control devices on all towers it monitors. As a result, AEP states that “users of the AEP System, like users of the Eagle and Hark Systems,” systems for which the Commission previously approved waivers of section 17.47(b), “are alerted to actual and potential problems immediately in many cases and at most within twenty-four hours.”
At each AEPMS monitored tower, the tower site receives “alarms from the light controller, which contacts the AEP Network Operations Center (NOC) for every type of alarm condition.” The AEPMS classifies alarms as either critical or minor. Failure categories treated as critical include: beacon/strobe/flashing sidelight, beacon/strobe communication, photocell, site communication, power, GPS Sync, filter, low flash energy, and consecutive missed flashes. Side and single marker failures are classified as minor.
These alarms are captured and archived within the AEPMS database, which has an automated escalation protocol. If, after 30 minutes, the problem is not corrected and the alarm requires a Notice to Air Mission (NOTAM) to be filed, AEP NOC personnel issue and record a manual NOTAM. In the event of a NOTAM-worthy event, NOC personnel create a field service ticket for a site equipment inspection, with such inspections to be completed within seven days.
The AEP System is programmed to proactively initiate a connection from each monitored site at least once every hour or 24 times per every 24 hours. In the event communications are lost, the system generates an alarm requiring a NOC Technician to attempt to contact the site manually. If the NOC Technician is unable to connect to the tower, a NOTAM is issued and alerts are sent to the designated responsible site contacts for follow up.
The FCC said AEP’s tower lighting monitoring system is similar to other systems that are robust enough, based on the system and backup procedures, to be exempt from the quarterly inspection. The agency said, “The AEPMS is similar in that it has a continuous and permanent two-way link between the tower site and the response center; timely reporting of potential problems; continuously staffed response centers; 24-hour polling of both lighting and communications systems; on demand interrogation capabilities; backup response centers; and essentially uninterrupted communications between the response center and the towers during power outages.”
By Leslie Stimson, Inside Towers Washington Bureau Chief
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