Occupying the highest point in Allegany County, MD, the cell tower atop Dan’s Mountain south of Frostburg in western Maryland is in need of repairs. According to the Cumberland Times-News, the 330-foot tower was hit by lightning. The resulting damage has caused communications issues for emergency services in Allegany and Garrett Counties. Officials say the strike occurred last April but was not immediately detected.
“It did not really cause much disruption because there was no foliage on the trees at the time and it was able to put out the signal,” explained Roger Bennett, Deputy Emergency Management Director. “It’s our primary tower for the alerting system. Our radio system that we talk to each other on, its main tower is down state. But for Allegany and Garrett counties, Dan’s Mountain tower is the main tower.”
“It looked like a foliage issue because every summer the message gets muffled by the foliage on the trees,” he continued. “We knew there was an issue all along; it was a matter of finding it. We continued to troubleshoot it until we had found that we had taken a strike on the microwave system that communicated with our other six towers. Eventually a piece of equipment was seen hanging from the tower.”
With the problem now identified, the county Commissioners began a discussion about repairs, eventually reaching a unanimous agreement to spend $57,000 with a five-year maintenance program.
“This is obviously emergency funding,” County Administrator Jason Bennett told the Times-News. “So we are going to pull some existing capital project [funds] we think we have to fund this. I think we can handle it that way. Usually this is something we bid but due to the emergency nature of it, and the proprietary nature of it, we can address it quickly. No ground equipment can take every lightning strike,” he noted. “Sometimes it gets your equipment and sometimes it doesn’t.”
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