Carriers, Broadcasters Brace for Expected Hurricane on Gulf Coast

Florida and the communications industry are preparing for Idalia, a tropical storm that's expected to develop into a major hurricane before it makes landfall on the Gulf Coast in days. “It will become a hurricane ... without question,” said Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) at a Monday news conference in Largo, Florida. “Buckle up for this one.”

“Idalia is forecast to become a major hurricane early this week in the eastern Gulf of Mexico,” said a Monday alert on the National Weather Service website. The FCC didn’t comment.

Florida activated the state emergency operations center (EOC) and expanded an emergency order to cover 46 counties Monday, said the DeSantis office: The storm was expected to make landfall early Wednesday. "We do have the Starlink internet that we used a lot after Hurricane Ian,” noted DeSantis at the news conference in Largo. The state has 650 Starlink receiver dishes ready to deploy in the affected area, he said. Many Floridians should expect power outages from the hurricane, said DeSantis. The state was in contact with all major utility companies Monday, said DeSantis: About 40,000 linemen will be stationed before the storm hits to prepare to restore power.

The Florida Public Service Commission helps staff the EOC, which activated at 7 a.m. Monday, a PSC spokesperson emailed. “The state’s electric utilities report outages and restorations, which are monitored by PSC staff, posted to our website and used by the EOC.” The commission does storm preparations throughout the year, including an annual May workshop before hurricane season begins, noted the PSC rep: The agency had no plans to close its Tallahassee headquarters. Georgia also activated its state operations center to monitor Idalia, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp's office said Monday.

Lumen is monitoring the storm's progress, a company spokesperson said. "Our network is fully operational at all sites, and emergency generators are in place should we lose commercial power," the spokesperson said: "We’re prepared to run on fuel and battery resources as long as refueling resources are available to us.” The company laid out its disaster preparedness plan at the Florida PSC’s May hurricane preparation workshop, saying it prepares facilities within a target area six days before an event and targets sites without power immediately after an event to remediate any issues. Lumen also emphasized the need to partner with government representatives and power companies to respond to future disasters.

“With the expectation of significant damage from strong winds and flooding from the storm, Verizon’s network team is preparing for the worst,” Verizon said Monday: “While the use of battery and generator backup systems in critical locations such as cell sites and network operations centers serve to minimize the risk of disruption if commercial power is lost, even the most hardened infrastructure can be shaken by Mother Nature.” Verizon said its Frontline Crisis Response Team is also braced to deploy.

AT&T was topping off fuel in its generators ahead of the storm, testing back-up batteries at cellsites, “protecting physical facilities against flooding” and “staging … emergency response and network recovery equipment in strategic locations for quick deployment following the storm,” the carrier said Monday. FirstNet deployables are available “as needed,” AT&T said.

“We’ve been monitoring Idalia closely,” emailed a T-Mobile spokesperson: “Our emergency teams are readying and staging equipment and teams are preparing to deploy. We’ll have more info to share shortly as these details get confirmed.”

Florida’s TV and radio stations are well-prepared for the storm and possible power outages, said Florida Association of Broadcasters President Patrick Roberts. “I think Florida is as ready as anybody can be,” Roberts said. In most markets in the state, TV and radio broadcasters agreed on partnerships to allow news content from TV broadcasters to be aired over same market radio stations -- considered more resilient in disasters -- if a TV station is knocked off the air, Roberts said. The FCC also worked with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to allow broadcasters priority access to supplies such as fuel in the wake of the storm, Roberts said.

Terry Cole, general manager of Nexstar’s WMBB Panama City, keeps a 12,000 gallon tank of generator fuel topped off at the station’s transmitter throughout hurricane season, he told us. Current forecasts don’t show Panama City in Idalia’s direct path, but Cole said every broadcaster in Florida should have a plan in place for storm response. At WMMB, staffers going out to report on hurricanes are paired up for safety, he said. “Under no circumstances do you send somebody off by themselves,” Cole said. The station also monitors wind speeds and pulls back all their staffers when a storm’s winds get too powerful, relying instead on remote cameras, Cole said. The aftermath of a storm, when roads are impassable and power and water become hard to acquire, can be more difficult to cover than the storm itself, Cole said.