The number of U.S. tower climber deaths this year is down sharply from last year. Two climber deaths have been reported in Texas, one from a communications tower and one from a water tower. That compares to 10 climber deaths last year and 14 the year before, according to Wireless Estimator.
Some industry insiders attribute the better safety track record to the fact that business was slow for many contractors during the first half of 2015. Fewer climbs mean fewer falls, and fewer jobs mean that the less experienced climbers may not be working.
Now some contractors are seeing business pick up again, so keeping climbers safe may be more challenging. Fortunately there are lasting changes taking hold in the industry that can help keep climbers safe even in the busiest times. Three of these changes are outlined below.
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1. Smartphones are making tower climbers safer
Cell towers enable smartphones and now smartphones are helping protect the climbers who build and maintain towers.
“There is enhanced capability provided by having smartphones in the field with some back office software that will … help us feel much better about what’s happening on a remote site,” said Kevin Hostetler, CEO of FDH Velocitel.
Hostetler said his company is preparing to deploy “a new software package that will capture and validate a lot of the safety training and equipment and hardhats and all that through a smartphone and … photograph it and automatically log it and attach it to the site.” He said that while safety checks are required on many climbs, the required documentation may not always occur before the climber makes his way to the tower top. Mobile software makes it much harder to delay safety checks.
“A lot of the stuff that may be manual reporting that realistically … may happen at the end of the shift, that stuff has to be done properly and documented electronically before we start the climb,” he said.
2. Training is becoming more standardized.
Two powerful industry associations are working hard to standardize training for tower workers. Wireless infrastructure association PCIA has won a grant from the Department of Labor to help standardize a curriculum for the wireless workforce, in partnership with several U.S. colleges and universities.
The National Wireless Safety Alliance is another training resource, chartered this year by the National Association of Tower Erectors’ Wireless Industry Safety Taskforce. The mission statement of NWSA is to provide thorough, independent assessments of knowledge and skills and provide verifiable worker certification in order to enhance tower safety, reduce workplace risk, improve quality, encourage training, and recognize the skilled professionals who work on towers.
“One of the certain changes in the industry is the elevated safety and training requirements for the tower hand, increasing levels of certification, kind of professionalization of the tower hand,” said Hostetler.
3. Carriers and tower companies are paying more attention
“There’s a groundswell now of support from all areas for improved recognition of the problems, figuring out the solutions and then implementing the solutions, and then holding people accountable and not letting the folks who have bad safety records basically do work in the industry,” said Jeffrey Stoops, CEO of SBA Communications.
Stoops said that during 2012, 2013 and 2014, all cell tower deaths but one were attributable to human error. “This can be fixed with better training [and] better selection [of crews],” he said.
Fortunately, industry trends are helping carriers in their quest to keep inadequately trained subcontractors off their towers. Larger infrastructure service providers have been buying smaller ones, bringing more workers into companies that can provide adequate safety training and offer key resources like training towers and field software.
