Disaster Recovery

As the Northeast continues to recover from the effects of Hurricane Sandy, critics have been quick to point out how vulnerable the communications infrastructure is to giant, unprecedented superstorms. Getting lost in the storm of "what-ifs," however, are the examples and data that showed how resilient and adaptive that infrastructure, and the people responsible for it, could be.

Verizon on Wednesday said that it making progress to reconnect communications services for its consumer, business and government customers in New Jersey, Long Island, New York City and other parts of the New York metropolitan area.

Optical Communications Group (OCG), a competitive fiber transport provider offering services throughout New York's five boroughs and parts of New Jersey, on Tuesday said that it kept its network running during Hurricane Sandy and is assisting area businesses and service providers with various connectivity options to help them restore or enhance their communications and backup systems.

Verizon Communications on Sunday said it was making continual progress to restore service to its wireline customers in its Mid-Atlantic and Northeast territories even as a Barclay's analyst put Verizon's restoration costs alone at $306 million.

XO Communications on Thursday reported that it is continuing to assess damage to its network caused by Hurricane Sandy and is conducting recovery efforts in major East Coast cities and as far west as Ohio.

Birch Communications, a CLEC serving a mix of SMBs and residential customers, on Thursday announced that it will waive service charges for any of its customers that suffered damage from Hurricane Sandy.