The National Association of Tower Erectors’ annual conference is always a good opportunity to take the tower industry’s pulse, and this year attendees reported record turnouts in New Orleans despite the fact the Mobile World Congress event occurred at the same time in Barcelona, Spain. One thing both shows shared was a significant amount of discussion around emerging “5G” technologies. NATE executive director Todd Schlekeway said whatever 5G turns out to be, the tower industry will be ready.
“NATE is watching closely the evolving nature of the industry, the migration to 5G technologies,” said Schlekeway. “Macro towers continue to be a primary source of communications and will always be, and NATE’s bread and butter is always going to be on the macro tower scale. … Macro towers are here to stay.”
In the near term, one big opportunity for the tower industry will emerge in the aftermath of this year’s 600 MHz spectrum auction. Carriers who acquire new spectrum will need tower technicians to deploy the spectrum and TV station owners will need tower crews to “repack” their remaining spectrum. There is debate about how many tower companies are actually qualified to work on broadcast towers. One industry veteran told us that after attending NATE Unite, he thinks some of these concerns are overblown and that by some estimates more than 40 companies are ready to assist the broadcasters with repacking.
Understanding just what level of training a tower technician has can be a challenge, but it’s a challenge NATE is addressing head on. NATE formed the National Wireless Safety Alliance to help standardize wireless worker certification.
“The NWSA has been successful in building an outstanding team of over 50 industry subject matter experts who have been instrumental in working to create the NWSA’s computer-based and field-based assessments for various categories of workers in the industry,” said AT&T’s Art Pregler, who chairs the NWSA’s board of governors. NWSA’s work is bearing fruit as the American National Safety Institute prepares to launch an accredited wireless worker certification program.
“The worker will have their own portable credential and the employer will be able to verify it,” explained Schlekeway. “This is going to elevate safety and quality, we feel, because it’s going to standardize the process nationwide and it’s going to set different job categories of workers.” The first two credentials will be tower tech 1 and tower tech 2, both expected to launch this fall. These will be followed by foreman classifications, and distributed antenna systems and small cell certifications.
Awards and honors
Awards and honors are always an important part of NATE’s annual conference and this year was no exception. Kevin Hayden, president of Hayden Tower Service, was honored as the recipient of the Bill Carlson Lifetime Service Award. Hayden was a founding member of NATE and was founding chairman of the board of directors. Carlson has also served in many committee leadership roles, including industry relations, financial investment, legislative and regulatory, and insurance.
Diane Mueller was honored as the recipient of the Distinguished Service Award. Mueller has volunteered on NATE’s member services committee for 18 years. She also helped with the formation of NATE’s first regional meeting last year and helped with coordination for NATE Unite.
This year at NATE Unite the Tower Family Foundation announced the official establishment of the Ernie Jones Memorial Civil Engineering Scholarship at the University of Evansville in Evansville, Indiana. Jones was a prominent structural engineer who passed away last year while inspecting a tower. Jones assisted with writing and approving the ANSI-TIA/EIA 222 standard, which is the national standard for steel antenna towers and antenna supporting structures.
“His contributions to NATE and the entire industry made an indelible impact on safety,” said NATE chairman Jim Coleman. “On behalf of both NATE and the Tower Family Foundation, we are honored to recognize the legacy of Ernie Jones through the formal establishment of this scholarship program at the University of Evansville’s College of Engineering.”
