Comms slowly coming back in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico’s VHF radio system is expected to be fully back online this week, restoring communication between more than 30 municipalities and the Puerto Rico Emergency Management Agency.

As of 6 October, around one-third of the island’s VHF radio system had been restored.

Communications of all kinds were knocked out across the island by Hurricane Maria.

According to the US FCC, both Public Safety Answering Points in Puerto Rico were reported as operational on 11 October, while in the US Virgin Islands — also hit by the hurricane — both the St. Croix and the St. Thomas 9-1-1 call centres were reported as operational.

As of 11 October, 77.6% of Puerto Rico’s cell sites were out of service, with 15 out of 78 counties having 100% of their cell sites down.

“The four major wireless companies have opened up roaming on the islands so that they, collectively, can serve the maximum population of the islands with the current coverage available,” an FCC report said.

“They are coordinating and prioritising the recovery of cell sites and placement of temporary assets with the other carriers to maximise the coverage for all subscribers.”

Satellite Cells on Light Trucks (COLTs) have been deployed in 11 locations and terrestrial Cells on Wheels (COWs)/COLTs in four locations. Approximately 54% of Puerto Rico’s population was reported on 10 October to be covered by wireless carriers.

In the US Virgin Islands, 54.5% of cell sites were out of service on 11 October, with 100% of cell sites in St. John out of service. Approximately 79% of the population was reported to be covered by wireless carriers on 10 October.

Widespread power outages in Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands have left large numbers of consumers without either cable services or wireline service (one Puerto Rico cable company has reported that approximately 1% of its consumers have had service restored).

Image: Relief efforts in Puerto Rico, courtesy US Army.

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