FCC, Industry Prepare for Irma; Pai Visits Texas; Amazon Faces Price Gouging Complaints

The FCC and industry stepped up preparations for Hurricane Irma -- a Category 5 storm that was near Puerto Rico Wednesday and projected to head toward Florida. The Public Safety Bureau activated its disaster information reporting system (DIRS) for Irma to facilitate communications provider reports on infrastructure status and other storm-related situations. Reports are requested starting at 10 a.m. Thursday and continuing daily at that time until the system is deactivated for Irma, said a public notice. (The agency deactivated DIRS for Hurricane Harvey, said another PN, one of several Tuesday.) FCC bureaus announced procedures to help communications providers "initiate, resume, and maintain operations" in areas affected by Irma, said a PN, with guidance on special temporary authority requests and much contact information. A PN announced a 24/7 call line (202-418-1122) and email address (FCCOPCenter@fcc.gov) to address emergency needs. An FCC webpage on Irma contains links to various resources. "FCC public safety staff is busy preparing for the arrival of Hurricane Irma while continuing to respond to the aftermath of #Harvey," tweeted Chief of Staff Matt Berry. Chairman Ajit Pai Wednesday visited 911 operations and other facilities in Texas to view the damage from Harvey, said a release. Comcast is making its 137,000-plus Xfinity Wi-Fi hot spots in Florida available to non-Comcast customers through Sept. 15 in anticipation of Hurricane Irma's landfall, it said Wednesday. It also prepared facilities including staging emergency generators and fuel trucks and bringing in extra technical and network restoration teams. AT&T (here), T-Mobile (here) and Verizon (here, here) issued releases on Irma preparations. Amazon faced allegations of price gouging on bottled water in Florida as Irma approached, according to some reports (here, here). The company doesn't "engage in surge pricing," it emailed. "Amazon prices do not fluctuate by region or delivery location. Prices on bottled water from Amazon, and third-party sellers that are doing their own fulfillment to customers, have not widely fluctuated in the last month.”