Openreach says it has hired 3,500 new engineers and spent “record amounts” on snow and ice equipment to help its staff fix broadband problems quickly, avoiding the severe delays of previous winters.
It claims to have bought 78,000 kilos of rock salt, 1,500 snow shovels and 6,300 ice and snow grips for footwear.
Engineers will also have 2,050 sets of snow socks for van tyres, 27,800 litres of screenwash, 29,700 de-icer sprays, and 3,550 kilos of salt solution for thawing frozen manholes.
The preparations follow major broadband and phone failures during last February’s ‘Beast from the East’ storm, which covered much of the UK in heavy snow and led to 16 deaths. Engineers trying to fix problems were hampered by the extreme conditions.
Openreach, the division of BT that maintains…
