Vultures On The Line

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31077, 4 June 1966, Page 5

Vultures On The Line

VULTURES posed a con- ’ siderable problem for the British telecommunications firm of A.T.E. when they were installing telephones on a motorway in West Africa, where telephone boxes are provided at frequent intervals for the use of stranded motorists.

Interviewed by the 8.8. C. Mr A. J. Troen explained that these birds, weighing 20 pounds or more, had a persistent habit of perching on overhead wires and bringing them down. Drawbacks to the alternative of putting cables underground were that they tended to get washed away in heavy rain, and were liable to interference from termites and other forms of underground life.

The company solved the problem by developing a radio-telephone powered by energy from the sun and installing instruments in booths spaced along the motorway at two to three-mile intervals.

In effect, each telephone box was a radio station in

itself with mast and aerial of its own.

Since each was independent, there was no need to link them by cable, because no source of power was required other than the energy from the sun. The amount of energy stored in the battery associated with the sets would keep them running for more than 24 hours during rainy spells. The system had been used in Britain, said Mr Troen, and operated quite successfully even there. He estimated that a typical installation of this type could be provided at about half the cost either of overhead or underground cable installation.