Verizon uses line between trees to restore Lake Delton service
When Lake Delton overflowed Monday and excavated a path to the nearby Wisconsin River through what was a slice of land containing County A, it also tore out underground utility lines.
Local contractor Allen Steele and his workers stretched a temporary sewer line across the 200-yard breach on Tuesday, stopping the flow of raw sewage into the river.
Seeing what Steele had done, Verizon contacted him about restoring telecom services to about 450 customers who lost theirs when Verizon's fiber optic line was destroyed.
"We could have gone burrowing underneath, but that might have taken several days," Verizon regional spokeswoman Lou Ann Novak said.
Instead, Novak said, phone and Internet service was quickly restored via a "messenger" line -- a very strong line that creates what amounts to a hanging frame -- anchored to and strung between trees on opposite sides of the breach, about 12 to 15 feet above the water level. The fiber optic line then was attached to the messenger line.
Service was officially restored about 8:45 p.m. Tuesday, Novak said.
"I don't know of another place where we have fiber optic cable hanging from trees," she said. "Obviously this is a completely temporary situation."
A permanent solution will have to wait until officials decide how to restructure the breach area.
