DIRS Coverage for Storms Marco and Laura Extended to Counties in 19 states

The FCC greatly extended the area covered by the disaster information reporting system for tropical storms Laura and Marco, said a public notice Wednesday. Reports will now cover counties in Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Washington, D.C., Indiana, Missouri, Tennessee, Oklahoma and Illinois, along with previously included states Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi and Texas. Reports from communications providers in those originally included states and Missouri, Oklahoma and Tennessee were due starting Thursday, while the providers in the rest were to begin submitting reports Friday. The extended coverage was requested by the Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the PN said. There were 192,915 cable and wireline subscribers out of service in the affected areas reporting on Thursday, and 911 calls were being rerouted from two public service answering points in Louisiana and one in Texas that were evacuated, said Thursday’s DIRS report. The report showed 1.3 percent of cellsites down in the affected area, with three TV stations, six FM stations and one AM station out of service.