Archive for December, 2010

Well the snow has gone for the south and I feel for the rest of the country that still has snow or has more snow falling. I always find the first few hours fun, then the tedium of working in it starts to erode the enjoyment.

We are now working in freezing fog. I personally find this harder to work in than snow. Ever bit of metal on the aerial or satellite dish sticks to your hand as if fixed with super glue. Within five minutes all feeling has been lost in your fingers. Trying to make a delicate connection with the cable to the satellite dish or aerial becomes a major skills operation. Its like trying to thread a needle with your toes.

Fibre optics has started to impact television and satellite systems in a major way now, and the golden rule in fibre connections is keep every thing clean; clean the joints and keep them clean. So this is the scenario, working on a flat roof covered in frozen slush and ice, 20ft drop down the side and no barriers. The safety lines are frozen into long rods of rope, so that movment is being a puppet on the end of a stick!

When a work surface has been cleared on the roof and a mat laid down the ice under it starts to melt and very very slowly begins soaking through the matting and then freezes again when in contact the the air. Of course this has gone un-noticed till you reach for the cleaning gun and its stuck to the mat, the connecors have a film of ice and when you pick them up the ice turns to water and the connectors are soaked.

I have now found the solution to remedy these problems. Turn the heater on in the van, pack up and get warm and wait for the fog to clear.

Due to the heavy snow, Thursday 2nd Dec, we will be keeping the vans off the roads. We will be keeping an eye on the weather reports.

We have to consider the safety of the engineer getting to and from calls, but also having got to the house would it be safe to get onto the roofs today.

With luck we will be back at work tomorrow even if its a reduced service.

More updates will be posted on this blog.