Gustav brings down cell, Internet service

Power outages caused by Hurricane Gustav brought down cellular and Internet service in parts of Louisiana, but its impact was much milder than that of Katrina. AT&T, the main landline phone company in the state, said it had 2,000 employees working to assess damage and perform repairs. Most of its cellular towers in areas hit by the hurricane were working Tuesday, according to spokesman Drew Giblin. Verizon Wireless said fewer than 1 percent of its Gulf Coast cell towers were out of operation Tuesday morning, mostly due to power outages. "Power is the only critical issue affecting our network," added Sprint Nextel Corp. spokeswoman Stephanie Vinge-Walsh. On Tuesday morning, the company was waiting for permission from officials to enter stricken areas so it could connect portable generators to blacked-out cell sites and refill the fuel tanks of those that have their own generators. T-Mobile USA said it had also some network disruptions in south-central Louisiana due to commercial power issues. The Associated Press bureau in New Orleans had no landline phone service Tuesday morning, and reporters had problems with their cell phones. Katrina had a wider impact on telecommunications in 2005, prompting the Federal Communications Commission to propose a requirement that cellular carriers have eight-hour backup batteries for all their cell sites. Wireless industry association CTIA, Sprint and T-Mobile fought the requirement in court and have prevented it from taking effect. The carriers say that requiring each cell site, even in areas that aren't disaster-prone, to have its own backup power is expensive and robs the companies of the flexibility to deploy generators in more sensitive areas.