Lost Internet Service During a Local Power Failure - OptimumOnline (2024)

boatright
join:2004-07-28
Austin, TX

boatright

Member

Today 6:31 am

We have a whole-house backup generator so our house (and cable modem) have electricity during a neighborhood power outage. We've lived in our current home in Tyler, TX, for a little more than a year and I've noticed that local power failures immediately bring down the internet service.

In other places I've lived the cable distribution system was backed up with battery power and we wouldn't lose internet service except for very long outages.

Does Optimum also back up its distribution network with battery power? Is the situation I am describing indicative of a problem that can be repaired or is this the expected behavior with Optimum's network?

· actions · Today 6:31 am ·

Well Bonded
join:2015-10-17
Naples, FL

Well Bonded

Member

Today 8:25 am

Many providers are notorious about maintaining their backup batteries, as such any power failures take their service out.

· actions · Today 8:25 am ·

limegrass69
No Whammies
join:2008-05-28

limegrass69

Member

Today 8:34 am

Notorious. As in notorious for poor maintenance.
In the NYC area, Altice's predecessor, Cablevision, was pretty on top of plant maintenance. Towards the end of their tenure, maintenance (including backup batteries) started to slip. It fell off a cliff when Altice came to town.

One should assume no service during a power outage.

In my area, Verizon is not much better. Cellular gets overloaded and can't be relied upon either. It is the world we live in. Not much you can do!

· actions · Today 8:34 am ·

Bobcat00 to boatright

Member

Today 10:11 am

This is what has worked for me more than once:

The next time you see a tech working on Optimum's outside boxes, ask him if the equipment has battery backups for power failures. If he says they do, kindly tell him that the batteries serving your area are dead and ask if he can put in a request to have them replaced.

Be polite and don't make it sound like you're complaining or that it should be his job to do it. They don't carry batteries and it would be a separate truck roll to take care of it (assuming it's even possible in your area).

· actions · Today 10:11 am ·

batterup to limegrass69

Premium Member

Today 12:28 pm

Verizon has a room size backup generator in every central office.

· actions · Today 12:28 pm ·

batterup to Bobcat00

Premium Member

Today 12:31 pm

Should I wash his feet wile I'm kissing his ass. If I lost internets I would drop the ass-hats.

· actions · Today 12:31 pm ·

Bobcat00

Member

Today 12:49 pm

· actions · Today 12:49 pm ·

boatright
join:2004-07-28
Austin, TX

boatright to Bobcat00

Member

Today 1:29 pm

A good suggestion, but I've never stumbled upon such a technician. I decided to subject myself to the torture of contacting Support. As expected they didn't really understand the issue I was describing, but we did end with the agent agreeing to send a technician out. I know that won't immediately accomplish anything, but I assume he'll know whether there is supposed to be battery-backed infrastructure and how to reach the people who can actually get it fixed. The appointment isn't until the 16th, but if I manage to accomplish something with this route, I'll update the thread.

From what I can tell it seems like ISPs that provide phone service are required to have service that survives, at least for a period of time, in a blackout. This requirement is also what led to the requirement that cable modems have an optional battery backup (funded by the customer, but made available by the ISP). That would accomplish nothing if the infrastructure itself weren't backed up by batteries. I'm not completely sure I understood all of the FCC legalese on the topic or whether what I was reading was a proposed rule or an actual rule, so maybe I am wrong about the "requirement." In any event, I press on...

· actions · Today 1:29 pm ·

dfens42

Member

Today 2:20 pm

The requirement was/is for POTS/landline service. Because they provide enough current through the wiring to run a corded phone. And they maintain batteries in the local CO, they're racks and racks, and it is done to maintain 911 svc along with those POTS connections. If you have a cordless phone, it will not work.

As for VOIP, the modem has to have a working battery backup as well, plus the plant. And most providers have stopped providing them to customers, so I can imagine the plant batteries probably won't do much either. Fiber needs battery as well.

Cell service normally has some kind of minimal battery and generator backup at the towers, etc. But, if you don't have your account with the primary company (VZ, ATT, T-Mobile) maintaining the towers and equipment, I know for a fact in some disasters (hurricanes specifically) secondary providers had very spotty or no service.

· actions · Today 2:20 pm ·

Bobcat00

Member

Today 2:23 pm

Optimum hasn't provided modems with backup batteries for many years. And even when they did provide modems with battery capability, they didn't provide batteries.

The funny thing is that the modems had a firmware bug where if the RF was lost (e.g., power failure) and the modem stayed on (e.g., backup battery or UPS), when the RF came back on, the WAN port would only negotiate to 100 Mbps. So you were actually better off without the battery/UPS.

· actions · Today 2:23 pm ·

Well Bonded
join:2015-10-17
Naples, FL

Well Bonded to batterup

Member

Today 3:05 pm

Which doesn't matter when there is electronics out in the field.

· actions · Today 3:05 pm ·

Well Bonded to dfens42

Member

Today 3:14 pm

Which doesn't happen if the batteries in the electronics out in the field are dead.

Cell service normally has some kind of minimal battery and generator backup at the towers, etc. But, if you don't have your account with the primary company (VZ, ATT, T-Mobile) maintaining the towers and equipment, I know for a fact in some disasters (hurricanes specifically) secondary providers had very spotty or no service.

Which is a false statement, most cellular providers do have battery backup backed up by gensets, as for secondary providers they are just reselling the primary providers service, that have no equipment in the field at all.

Now a major problem with cellular outages after a storm is the landline providers loss of power to the equipment powering the circuits that handle the sites backhaul.

· actions · Today 3:14 pm ·

batterup to Well Bonded

Premium Member

Today 4:32 pm

The electronics in the field, none required for FiOS, have batteries and and a plug that truck mounted generators attach to. The Phone Company isn't a piss-ant cable company.

· actions · Today 4:32 pm ·

batterup to Well Bonded

Premium Member

Today 4:38 pm

That will not happen, those are enterprise loops with a guarantied up time of 99.9%.

During Sandy I lost cell from all four carriers; Sprint went down in an hour the others were up longer but they all went down. They came back a day later. My cable modem was down for eleven days. My DSL/POTS never went down.

· actions · Today 4:38 pm ·

wdunwoody

Member

Today 4:59 pm

Same here. I didn't have backup power for the DSL modem; but my laptop had a modem and I was able to connect to 56k dial up internet. Worked slow, but fine.

· actions · Today 4:59 pm ·

Well Bonded
join:2015-10-17
Naples, FL

Well Bonded to batterup

Member

Today 5:14 pm

You just conflicted yourself and yea they may have batteries that last oh maybe 4 hours when new.

However after a disaster it may be a day or two before we can tow gensets out to remote sites and that are distributed by the communications priority level and consumer internet and RT POTS is at the bottom of that pile.

· actions · Today 5:14 pm ·

Well Bonded to batterup

Member

Today 5:17 pm

Total BS, that 99.9% does not apply once their has been a disaster.

And I have been involved in many of restorations after one, so I have a clue of reality versus what you can Google.

· actions · Today 5:17 pm ·

Bobcat00 to batterup

Member

Today 5:24 pm

Verizon Wireless was up 100% of the time during Sandy. Coworkers with Fios report their service also stayed up.

That was back when we paid per text message, and VZW made text messages free for most of the month.

· actions · Today 5:24 pm ·

batterup to Well Bonded

Premium Member

Today 5:26 pm

Angus gets it done NOW.

· actions · Today 5:26 pm ·

batterup to Well Bonded

Premium Member

Today 5:28 pm

I was restoring service when you were still swimming in your father's gonads.

· actions · Today 5:28 pm ·

batterup to Bobcat00

Premium Member

Today 5:29 pm

My tower went down.

· actions · Today 5:29 pm ·

Well Bonded
join:2015-10-17
Naples, FL

Well Bonded to batterup

Member

Today 5:31 pm

· actions · Today 5:31 pm ·

Well Bonded to batterup

Member

Today 5:33 pm

Maybe it did but do you know why?

· actions · Today 5:33 pm ·

Bobcat00 to batterup

Member

Today 5:43 pm

My closest "tower" in on Verizon's Network Operations Center building. The second closest is at the CO, with its big-ass diesel generator. The third is at Trump's golf course, I don't know if it has a generator or not. So we're basically going to be up all the time.

Except when we had our last JCP&L power failure! VZW service was brought to its knees. I was able to get a better signal if I went upstairs and presumably got a signal from the other side of the mountain. I don't know how to figure out which tower I'm on with a 5G iPhone. With CDMA, you could tell from the PN offsets.

· actions · Today 5:43 pm ·

wdunwoody

Member

Today 6:21 pm

During Sandy, my power (JCP&L) was out for 12 days. And electrically, I am only about... 20 pole spans away from the main substation, which I observed WAS energized on the transmission (34.5kV) side.

Verizon POTS/DSL and FIOS stayed up the whole time because the Central Office was built to Bellcore standards. It had(has) an extensive battery plant as well as on-site generators and fuel supply.

Verizon Wireless right at the coast stayed up for about 4 days or so; until the cell tower generator fuel supplies, and then the batteries ran out. Some of those tower sites could not be reached to refuel.

Optimum service... as long as you could power your modem, set top box and
TV; started to drop as the batteries in their remote line amplifiers failed. As a previous poster said, back then, Optimum tended to keep up their remote batteries, while Altice these days do not...

· actions · Today 6:21 pm ·

Bobcat00

Member

Today 38 minutes ago

Our Optimum node's batteries (built by TKR) never lasted more than 1 hr 10 min.

Isn't 34.5 kV considered distribution?

· actions · Today 38 minutes ago ·

batterup to Well Bonded

Premium Member

Today 36 minutes ago

I assume because there was no generator backup. The providers didn't go out at once, they went out one by one over several hours as their batteries died. It took a day after they went out that they all came back up together. I assume they brought in a generator as the power didn't come back on for many days.

· actions · Today 36 minutes ago ·

wdunwoody to Bobcat00

Member

Today moments ago

...maybe "subtransmission" would be more accurate for 34.5kv? Around here, JCP&L only uses 34.5kV to feed substations. They usually use 2400/4160 for distribution around town to the local pole top transformers... although there is some 13kV used...

· actions · Today moments ago ·