This summer, cellphone-toting concertgoers at Red Rocks Amphitheatre and diners crowding Civic Center for the Taste of Colorado may be tapping into a portable wireless network originally intended for communication between disaster relief workers.
Cells on Wheels and Cells on Light Trucks – COWs and COLTs, as they’re called – get towed to NASCAR races and football games, mountain events like the Telluride Bluegrass Festival and shows at the Colorado Convention Center.
In the highly competitive cellphone industry, carriers want to ensure service at crowded events where hundreds of people chatting at once can jam their existing cellular networks. So they’ve taken to attaching their wireless equipment to light trucks and flatbed trailers.
“It’s a nice asset to have for the network if there’s a temporary spike in usage,” said Bob Kelley, a Verizon Wireless spokesman. “It’s an extension of the effort we put into making sure we have the most reliable network.”
Especially when users are snapping and e-mailing concert photos with their camera phones and rockers like Bono urge fans to send text messages pledging to support various humanitarian causes.
Kelley wouldn’t give exact details about Verizon’s plans for its COWs and COLTs in Colorado this year, but the carrier has parked a unit in front of the Colorado Convention Center.
T-Mobile deployed a Cell on Wheels site to the ESPN Winter X Games in Aspen earlier this year, said spokeswoman Kristen Resare.
Equipment on the mobile sites costs about $500,000 at Verizon Wireless, which has several COWs and COLTs. The sites can handle thousands of additional calls per hour, according to Verizon statistics.
Cingular has used its mobile cell sites for massive law-enforcement efforts such as the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart in Utah in 2002, said Anne Marshall, a Cingular spokeswoman. Trucks were stationed in Salt Lake City to handle additional use by police.
“When needed, especially by law enforcement, we’re willing to add portable capacity,” Marshall said.
Sprint sent a mobile emergency response unit to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
Verizon’s mobile units were used as firefighting command stations during wildfires in western Montana last summer.
Staff writer Beth Potter can be reached at 303-820-1503 or bpotter@denverpost.com.
