Randy Edmunds Meets with Bell Aliant Officials

Randy Edmunds, MHA for Torngat Mountains District met with officials from Bell Aliant in St.Johns to get an update on the internet upgrades in Northern Labrador.

He said on his Facebook status that it was also to get a sense of what we can expect in the coming months.

The following is a summary of that meeting.

Work has been underway for the last three months and equipment has been ordered.

Three of the 12 radios have arrived and have been placed onsite and the remaining nine are in the process of being shipped and some are still being manufactured.

The first step is to align Double Mer with the rest of the North coast and to start laying the main route or backbone transmission microwave system.

The main route will follow the microwave towers and the spur or links will be added when the main route is complete.

The main route or backbone line is as follows:
Goose-Bay- Mulligan Hill-Double Mer-Monkeyhill-Hopedale-Merrifield- Zoar- Nain.

When the backbone route is complete the ties or spurs from double Mer- Rigolet, Money Hill- to Makkovik and Postville, Merrifield to Natushish, and Nain to Voisey’s Bay can be brought online.

Hopedale and Nain are on the back bone route and may see service by the end of the year or early in the New Year.

The remaining communities will be in shortly afterwards and all should be done by May of next year.

All this is dependent on equipment arrival, weather conditions for work at the towers as well as connecting work between the towers and the communities that don’t have main line towers in the communities.

The initial increase will be 1.5 mgbts which is standard.

This will be 12 to 15 times faster than existing speeds, increases up to .5 mgbts will be offered at a later phase.

He added that Bell aliant indicated that they will provide him with updates throughout the project and they did remind him that the task at hand is very time consuming and technical.