So, a little history so you understand why the landline phones don't work during a power outage. After the Paint Fire in 1990, the phone lines had burned and needed to be reinstalled. With forward thinking, the phone company at the time decided to rewire everything with fiber optic instead of copper wire. Copper wire is what carries the small electrical charge to power the phone system. Without the copper wiring, we now have to rely on a battery pack in the junction box (ours is located at Manzanita and Lookout Rd.) The batteries are dead. After nearly 7 years of fighting with Verizon, and then Frontier, they replaced the batteries, which were promptly depleted and killed during the Whittier Fire in 2017. Several months ago, after a power outage, it took 12 hours after the power was restored for the batteries to be charged enough to run the system. As we are now nearing 24 hours since the last outage.... I'm thinking the batteries are once again, officially dead.
The new Frontier internet system is independent of the phone system, but does rely on Edison to power it, so when the power goes out, so does the internet. It is restored when the power comes back on, however.
Please know, when the power goes out, and the phones go with it, there are one or two people that dedicate an hour or more of their time reporting it and complaining. There needs to be more. Please join us in letting Frontier know that this is not acceptable.
Jessica, do you have any idea how many households on the mountain have a Frontier landline?