Case Study

Groton School Calls on KTS to Repair Cabling Damaged in a Winter Accident

The Work

Groton School, a long-time customer of KTS, contacted them following a mishap that took their main entrance cameras offline. A car driving near the school lost control and slammed into an electric pole snapping the pole at the top and bottom – fortunately the driver walked away from the accident. In addition to the electrical wires and telecommunications wires supplied by local utilities, a Groton School security camera was mounted on the pole along with wiring from the school and wiring to another pole – three poles away – that had an additional school security camera on it. These are important security camera locations that monitor who enters and exits the school property.

KTS assessed the damage and made a plan to get the cameras back up and running. Working closely with the school’s facilities and grounds department, they performed repairs.

The frozen ground combined with the way the pole broke meant that the conduit that brought the fiber optic cabling to the pole was largely damaged and inaccessible. The school’s building & maintenance crew dug out the end of the damaged conduit, replaced it with new conduit and re-attached it to the pole. The damaged fiber needed to be replaced, so KTS snaked the conduit back to a pull box through the repaired conduit and installed a new section of fiber from the pull box to the new pole box.

Then, KTS installed an aerial splice enclosure mid-way between the new pole and the next pole with the damaged fiber going to the second camera. The damaged fiber was stripped back and installed into the splice enclosure, a new section of fiber was installed from the aerial splice enclosure to the new box; both fibers were fusion spliced in the enclosure. The fiber from the aerial splice enclosure was fusion spliced to some of the new pole fiber strands.

Some strands of this new fiber were also used to replace the broken section of fiber which connected the second camera three poles away. This was fusion-spliced, housed in an aerial splice enclosure and connected to get the second camera back online.

Challenges

The biggest challenge was the winter weather. Finding viable workarounds is a skill that KTS has developed and mastered in their over 40 years in business. The frozen ground combined with the way the conduit for the wiring was broken meant an alternative was necessary, and KTS determined the best alternative and implemented it.

Benefits/Impact

The security cameras were back up and running despite the obstacles the New England winter weather presented. The school administration, staff, parents and students can feel confident of their safety now that the security cameras are back online.