Long Lines Techs at work


Robert Evans, now retired from AT&T Long Lines, in front of his office:
a Snow Cat positioned in front of an Oregon Long Lines site.

Bob was an MW technician for 37+ years, before his retirement in
1998. The last twelve years, he worked on mountaintop sites
in NW Oregon.

Bob writes: "All the pictures are either at or around the AT&T microwave site named South Saddle Mountain approximately 50 miles West of Portland Oregon at an elevation of 3500 feet. All winter long I would travel to the site either by sno cat or walk in on snow shoes. Yes, I loved my job!!"

All pictures courtesy of Robert Evans, AT&T Long Lines, Retired.


Aerial view of S Saddle Mountain... The blue boxes are the 5 transformers that convert 10KV 2 phase to 440v ~AC 3 phase. The antennas on the right side of the tower are facing Portland Oregon some 50 miles away.


Winter photo looking down on a deck of clouds to the East. If you look carefully you can make out 12,000' Mt Hood some 125 miles to the East. This particular tower is 30' on a side and 110 feet tall, built to withstand 100+ MPH winds that hit it every winter from the Pacific Ocean only 25 miles to the West.


The equipment to the left is retired TD-2 analog turned off in 1990-1992... Directly behind me (the rack behind my head) is the DR-6 digital microwave equipment feeding Portland Or, Seattle Washington, and South to California. The DR-6 is the only active equipment in the station at this moment and will probably be turned off in 2001.


Bob surveying the snow conditions several miles from the South Saddle site. This day the snow was over 10 feet deep. We were having trouble with the 1972 Tucker sno-cat and I was recalling our motto... "No job is so important and no service so great that we cannot take time to perform our job safely." About 10 minutes later the cat broke down.


Bob and his favorite vehicle during 37+ years of service. Most mountain top radio techs really liked their Suburban because of their handling in snow and comfort during many miles on the road.

 


A summer photo of South Saddle taken just a few feet further down the road than picture #5... Over enthusiastic gun owners were always a problem with the large pressurized antennas... Every summer our antenna crew would have to stop by and patch many bullet holes in the large horns.

Bob's Home Web Page

Long Lines techs had to maintain equipment in all sorts
of weather and terrain. Where Snow Cats could not be used
because of weather or time constraints,
helicopters would be utilized to airlift technicians to fix a downed circuit.

Raised landing pads were sometimes
constructed to allow chopper access.

Return to Towers List