Data Networks Beefed Up for Donald Trump Inauguration

The Donald Trump Inauguration is going to be one big affair as far as data transfers are concerned with about 900,000 people armed with smartphones expected to attend. Anticipating the traffic on telecom networks, the four major telcos in the US have already beefed up their network infrastructure several notches up the normal requirement and as a result already invested several million dollars over the last two year period. While 900,000 dwarfs in comparison to some 1.9 million attendees at Obama’s 2009 inauguration but the fact the several million videos and images are expected to be shared gives this Donald Trump inauguration a one-of-a-kind flavour.

Verizon revealed the details of its network overhaul in the Washington DC area by claiming its going to use three-channel carrier aggregation as well as new tools like Remote Electrical Tilt (RET) antennas, that can be adjusted remotely to change the angle as needed and Matsing Ball technology that allows a carrier to divide crowds into sectors.

Similarly, AT&T said it has provided permanent LTE upgrades to 20 cell sites, with multi-beam antenna technology, a new 4G LTE tower built in the area, improvements to Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS) at hotels and airports; and the deployment of seven Super Cell on Wheels (COWs) along the National Mall.

The Super COWs each come with at least 10 antenna beams and better serve large crowds by dividing them into sections, each with its own dedicated beam. A team of more than 50 network engineers was put on task to map out and deploy the technology over a two-year period.