Tower companies prepared to mitigate impact of cyclone Yaas in West Bengal, Odisha

Telecom industry body TAIPA on Tuesday said the association and its members are in a state of readiness to mitigate the impact of Cyclone Yaas on telecom infrastructure in West Bengal and Odisha, adding that teams have been deployed to deal with any outage and restore connectivity.

All infrastructure provider (IP) members have taken necessary measures including preparedness in terms of Cell on Wheels (CoWs), arrangement of spare batteries, and adequate amount of diesel and generator sets, T R Dua, Director-General, Tower and Infrastructure Providers Association (TAIPA), said in a statement.

Teams are in a state of readiness to rectify any damage to telecom installations.

Cyclone Yaas Live

"TAIPA and its members such as Indus Towers, ATC Towers, Ascend Telecom, Summit Digitel and Tower Vision along with the telecom operators have geared up to mitigate the impact of cyclone Yaas...," the association said.

Barely a week after cyclone Tauktae battered the western coast, leaving behind a trail of destruction, the country is bracing for cyclone Yaas on the eastern coast.

Severe cyclonic storm Yaas is likely to make landfall near Dhamra Port in Odisha's Bhadrak district early on Wednesday morning, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has said.

"In case of electricity outage for a longer duration of time, our IP members have ensured adequate amount stock of diesel and DG sets to keep the sites running in Odisha and West Bengal," TAIPA said.

Besides this, additional telecom teams have been deployed by the telecom infrastructure providers to restore the telecom connectivity at the earliest, "951 for West Bengal and more than 500 for Odisha", the association said.

Spare batteries have also been arranged by the telecom infrastructure providers for ensuring uninterrupted telecom connectivity.

"The movement of telecom personnel will be a big challenge because of the wind speed and heavy rainfall, therefore, we have requested the State officials and DoT (Department of Telecom) for arranging the accommodation of the telecom personnel at the nearby impacted areas," Dua added.

TAIPA has also written to the chief secretaries of Odisha and West Bengal seeking urgent support and intervention on matters including unrestricted movement of frontline field staff/technicians for accessing telecom tower sites, availability of diesel for the tower sites, availability of uninterrupted and priority electricity for towers and Cell on Wheels deployment.