- In case you missed it, there were big flight delays on the East Coast yesterday after an important flight tower circuit failed
- And then, construction crews cut a backup fiber optic cable
- Perhaps the backup problem could have been prevented with fiber optic sensing technology
Yesterday, major airports along the East Coast of the U.S. suffered massive flight delays, and it all stemmed from an FAA tower circuit failure and then a fiber cut.
The flight delays and cancellations came just as New York was welcoming world leaders for the United Nations General Assembly. According to the New York Times, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney was forced to skip a summit and speech planned for Monday evening because of his flight delay.
The problems began when a communications circuit at a control center that manages flight traffic in the Philadelphia region failed, forcing Philadelphia and Newark to ground planes.
Unfortunately, when air traffic controllers attempted to switch to the backup communications system of fiber optic cable, the cable had been cut.
Verizon Communications told major news outlets yesterday that contractors had accidentally cut a fiber-optic cable in New Jersey, knocking out the backup connection. The cable runs along the Amtrak rail-line, and an Amtrak construction crew had cut the fiber.
“Construction contractors working in the area dug up and cut our cable,” Verizon said in a statement. “Verizon’s facilities were fully functional up to that point. Verizon bears no responsibility for this incident.”
Verizon estimated the fiber cut would take about 13 hours to repair. And the primary circuit that initially failed is due to be replaced as part of an overhaul of the nation's air-traffic-control system.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy blamed the nation’s aging air infrastructure on Congress’ failure to provide enough money for upgrades. He said in a post on X yesterday, “This incident underscores the need for additional funding to modernize aging infrastructure and prevent disruptions like this in the future.”
Fiber optic sensing might have helped
Most people in the broadband industry are well aware that fiber broadband isn’t just a technology that delivers fantastic symmetrical speeds for internet connectivity. But the fiber optic cables, themselves, can also act as giant sensors with use cases for public utilities, transportation companies and smart cities. One of the most important use cases is to detect fiber optic cuts before they happen. The technology can do this by detecting unusual vibrations near the cables and sending alerts to the owners of the cable.
Paul Dickinson, founder and principal of Smart Infrastructure Solutions and past chairman of the Fiber Optic Sensing Association is on a mission to promote the value of fiber optic sensing.
He told Fierce that underground excavation in the U.S. results in more than $80 billion in damages annually.
An organization called Common Ground Alliance (CGA) — a U.S.-based nonprofit focused on preventing damage to underground utility infrastructure — promotes 811-call-before-you-dig practices.
But Dickinson said, “Despite focused organizations like the Common Ground Alliance, the fact of the matter is that with infrastructure building increasing in the U.S. the damages are increasing, not decreasing. And he noted that a lot more fiber is being laid because of the boom in AI data centers and the need to connect them.
“If we are going to rely upon data centers for national security, military, etc., we should deem their supporting infrastructure as critical infrastructure,” he said. “Well then, we need to protect it, right? Why would we not want to use pro-active, state of the art technology and design and integrate [fiber optic sensing] from the start?”
And we could ask, why would we not want to use fiber optic sensing for critical broadband that serves as a backup to air traffic control systems?
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