- During 3G and LTE network demand booms, cell tower technician deaths spiked
- Subcontracting has kept carriers insulated from liability and separated from training/safety practices
- Climbers have struggled to gain representation, but continue to take deep pride in the work
In 2007, cell phones were making their way into every pocket and purse. The iPhone had entered the market and telecom giants like AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile raced to build out the latest and greatest cell network — 3G — to meet the voracious demand.
But 2007 was also a year when 11 cell tower technicians in the U.S. fell to their death while building out this same network.
While the telecom industry may reflect on these years as one of major growth for cell network demands — and the broader world may remember it for the boom of smartphones and social media — the tower climbing workforce that made that network possible may look back on them more mournfully.
Tower climbing is inherently more dangerous job than your average nine-to-five. But in 2012, research from ProPublica and PBS Frontline found that cell tower technicians were 10 times more likely to die on the job than other construction workers. It was even reported as the most dangerous job in the country at the time by the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
What was causing this disproportionate danger compared to other construction roles?
As essential as cell towers were to the success of their cell service at the time, major carriers asserted that construction and maintenance of these towers was not part of their core business. So, subcontracting has been the industry’s economically sensible approach to managing the ad-hoc work of the sector.
But subcontracting also detached the carriers — sometimes by as many as three or four layers — from the critical workforce building its networks, both professionally and legally.
“What you wind up getting is bottom feeder companies,” industry veteran Brendon King said in the documentary, The Life of a Tower Climber. “These smaller companies go out and do these jobs for way under what they actually should cost, and everyone gets put in dangerous positions at that point.”
This is the introduction to an investigative article written for Broadband Nation's Learning Center, Fierce Network's sister publication.