Openreach Reveal Storm Eowyn Badly Damaged Over 500 UK Telecoms Poles
Network access provider Openreach (BT) has revealed that Storm Éowyn (pronounced ‘Ay-oh-win’), which violently struck the United Kingdom at the end of last week on Friday 24th January 2025 (here and here), has so far left more than 500 broadband / telecoms poles “badly damaged“, with reports continuing to come in.
The storm, which was the result of explosive cyclogenesis (aka – a weather bomb), focused most of its destructive energy on Ireland, Northern Ireland, Northern parts of Wales and Scotland. Record wind speeds of up to 114mph were even recorded in some of the worst hit areas and Openreach, as well as other network operators, are still in the process of repairing the damage it caused.
Such storms do have an impact on fixed broadband and mobile connectivity, which can be caused by a variety of different factors from storm damage (wind, floods etc.) to power outages and power surges (lightning) etc. Such things, when occurring over a wide area, can impact network capacity, stability and performance. Naturally, responding to this can put a strain on resources and so repairs sometimes take longer than usual, while other work (new provisions) in the same areas may often be delayed.
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The latest data from Openreach reveals that the operator saw a 1400% increase in public contacts on the day that Storm Éowyn struck, compared with a typical day. In addition, the sheer force of the storm, and so many falling trees, has left more than 500 poles badly damaged, with reports continuing to come in.
Openreach has previously informed ISPreview that it typically takes around 20 days to fix damaged poles (here). But pole repairs can also depend upon wider issues of road permits/permissions, availability of engineering resources, site safety, the level of local damage and delays from power companies (where relevant) etc.
Openreach Statement on Storm Éowyn Pole Damage
Replacing poles is one of the most complex jobs we do. It needs specialist equipment and engineers, specific safety measures, and often permissions for road closures with temporary traffic lights. In some areas, we’re replacing multiple poles making the whole process even more time-consuming.
Why do we use poles rather than burying every cable underground? It’s a lot to do with the economics, but also the disruption to communities that digging underground ducts entails. It’s not just hugely expensive to build networks underground, it also means far more road works and closures, bringing communities to a standstill.
We want to deliver a fast, reliable and – crucially – affordable service to millions of homes and businesses – and that’s what we’re doing. Our network has hundreds of competing service providers offering a big choice of products and services, and we’re constantly innovating to deliver the most resilient infrastructure possible in the most efficient way.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that underground networks aren’t immune from extreme weather events like flooding.
Suffice to say, we’ve seen before how homes in remote rural areas have sometimes been left to wait for up to 8-12 weeks before repairs take place to poles, although such cases are rare. However, in urban areas, resolving a downed pole may only be a matter of hours or just a few short days. Hopefully there won’t be too many cases like the former this winter, but there are usually a few like that.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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There are claims that this storm broke records yet the accounts of the “Big Wind” of 1839 suggest otherwise. I doubt that there will be any songs or poems written about Ewoyn.
Cant imagine there were many telecoms poles that came down in 1839. They probably had better chance of getting their poetry on Facebook.
@ unknownquantity
Indeed, it is worth noting that the Telegraph was introduced in England in 1838 – a few months before the storm.
The key takeaway was the most recent storm was not a record; the “Big Wind” storm had higher recorded speeds. It killed about 200 in the Liverpool and Lancashire area and sank at least 42 ships in UK waters.
Looking at the state of some poles around here, it don’t surprise me, there is one down the road that is not straight at all and have been like that for years. They must know about it, as it has fibre equipment on it, from both Zzoomm and Openreach. Even the one outside my place shakes when it is windy and with all the extra equipment on it, even more so.
The poles were never designed to have all the stuff on top they do and also lack of maintenance, like a BT cover a few roads away have had a crack in for a few years, one day it will fall in and someone will get hurt.
Sadly it is not just the telecoms sector that have this problem, Maintenance for a lot of things have seemed to have come to a stop. Yet, they keep on increasing prices, Looking at you Welsh Water.
There are significant and stringent rules regarding use of Openreach poles both by themselves and PIA providers. While a pole may be leaning, that doesn’t mean it’s structurally unsafe and if it has fibre equipment on it then it is certified to be accessed. Routinely, poles are fully tested every 6 or 12 years depending on certainly criteria but they are also tested (or should be) in a basic manner before each engineer climbs them. If a pole is dangerous in any way, it should be reported by the engineer for OR to investigate and re-read if required.
Regarding the chamber lid, if you report this to your council roads department they will flag this to Openreach and require it to be rectified.
The poles are fully capable of supporting the weight and forces imposed on them by the attached equipment.
@RobC, there may be significant and stringent rules, but this pole have been like it for a few years now and the last time I saw someone working on it, they were not climbing it, they were using a boom lift. The pole by me, they always climb, not sure if I would want to, even if I did not mind heights.
As for the chamber lid, it has been reported by a couple of people. I have not.
Ad47uk you spend all this time writing futile comments on ISPR and yet you’re not prepared to report a simple issue to authorities who can actually fix it. Says it all.
@Alex, if you have read what I put, you would have noticed I said it has been reported and nothing have been done, so do you really think I would make a difference? Companies don’t care any more, not their problem, until it breaks and someone gets hurt and then they will play the blame game.
Seen it before with here with work being done by gas.
It is typical of this country, sadly, poor workmanship and no pride in their work these days and have not been for years and if it cost companies money, they are not interested unless it get their shareholders more money
@ Ad47uk
“Companies don’t care any more, not their problem, until it breaks and someone gets hurt and then they will play the blame game.”
That bears no resemblance to reality at all. That point of view is an example of the kind that is invented by those who do not have any relevant experience.
This happens every time the UK has a storm.
In France they use concrete posts, and the only time I ever saw one broken was when the farmer hit it with a tractor.
France has a mix of pole types, just like the UK.
“We want to deliver a fast, reliable and – crucially – affordable service to millions of homes and businesses – and that’s what we’re doing.” (sic). So we hang it from a lump of dead wood. Makes me chuckle.
These poles have been used for years, they should be capable of holding up some cables if maintained., not sure about the other stuff that is shoved on them, but I suppose they must be okay. I presume a CBT is not that heavy, but all the cables may be, certainly the length of some of them
The one outside my house have around 15 cables coming from it, more than it had before as it now have fibre, while fibre is not heavy, the Openreach ones have copper cables in, so my next door neighbour, have too lots of cables going to her place. One copper, the other copper and fibre.
I have two as well, one Fibre and one copper.
The one by me shakes in the wind, but then I am on top of a hill, but I think that is more to do with the tension or lack of it on some of the cables, they blow around and shake the pole.
It should be okay, looks solid enough.
The word ‘affordable’ completely missing your brain then?
Getting rid of the ‘specialist equipment and engineers’ starting to look a bit short sighted.
Who said that Openreach has gotten rid of specialist equipment? A lot of outside work has been contracted out but the equipment and resources are still available to the business.
Time to do it under the ground instead. Poles are waste of time!
The poles are already in situ, so using them saves a considerable amount of time in the initial roll-out – especially when there are targets to be met. Specific cable runs can be moved to ducts at a later date when they are generating sufficient nett income to justify the investment.
Disruption and economics is still likely unfavourable for doing the entire run underground. This isnt a every day or even every month event.
Are you willing to pay the cost?
When Zzoomm first started installing here, they did go underground, some places they had no choice, but even in places that had pole they went underground. But I noticed even before they did mine, they were using poles more.
I presume it came down to cost.
@greggles – dead right. I mean, here we are with the entire rural 11kV rural distribution network on wooden poles, with pole-mounted transformers (far heavier than any telecomms stuff), yet where’s the clamour for that to be all undergrounded (and the transformers placed on the ground)? It’s non-existent because it would be utterly uneconomic.
Exactly how much more per month would you be prepared to pay for lines to be buried underground?
What is probably not helping is most of these poles will be carrying copper and fibre .That extra load making them more liable to damage in high winds
While we are on the subject of poles it’s disappointing to see the number of cables between poles as fibre is installed to properties. A carrier pole near here has 8 together in one direction and 7 together in the other. Seems to be what happens with 3 full fibre suppliers.
And some of them goes a fair distance, in fact I notice a few weeks ago, a cable between two poles supported by a lampost.
The headline says over 500, that is a bit vague. It could mean 5001 or 5 million.
In the context of about 70 million people plus unknown ‘trafficed’ and asylum seakers, over 500 poles is hardly worth the worry.
Where I live not far south of Birmingham, no storm damage at all, phone and internet to the customary standard