Post-Jeanne Cell Phone Service Problems?

HC-
I'm not currently on the island, but anyone I have called, it has gone straight to voicemail... the cell phone towers are probably out. There's no way to tell how quick they will be about fixing the problem, c'est la vie in STT

I did hear that one of the Sprint towers went down. My friends with Sprint phones are having trouble even accessing thier voice mail.

Given that the Sprint worked through the storm and has now stopped working a very likely possibility is the cell site has lost power. Usually they have standby batteries backed up by a generator.

Could be after the power went out the batteries worked for awhile then the generator either failed or ran out of fuel. If the road is blocked they may not be able to get to the tower to check what the problem is.

Jim

HipCrip,

I heard thru my sources that St. Croix had lost a major tower on Wednesday night. Don't know if this should affect you. It was an At&t tower, but of course everyone shares towers. I lost Sprint service yesterday for no good reason, but I have service back today. I think the lightning had more effect on the towers than the wind, but maybe it was just the combination. Good luck!

Teresa

I was up near Mountain Top and saw lightning hit the Sprint tower.
We have Sprint, and our service has been sporadic at best.
My vote goes to the "hit by lightning" theory.
Teresa, I don't think the 2 Choice towers in STX that got hit carried Sprint, but I'm not sure.

I use Cingular. So far I have had no problems (knock wood).

Cingular has become my favorite as well. Works where Sprint doesn't.

We just left STX yesterday but we had sporadic Sprint service after the TS. If we were able to get a signal, we had to agree to use roam (our plan includes free roaming services) and even then we had trouble with a continued call. I couldn't get voicemail either.

We flew through STT and there was limited service there too. It was fairly frustrating since we had a lot of calls to make.

Sharon,
Sorry you had problems with Sprint. I've used mine on three separate trips to STT and STX and never had a problem. It's always been free long distance to the mainland with no roaming charges. I'm sure your problems were caused by the storm.

We have also been having Sprint problems at Cowpet Bay. Sporadic service and many faded calls, so we've switched to land-line & calling card. I heard that a Sprint tower on St. John is down, so that may be part of our problem on the east end.

Max

I'm so glad I got Cingular. I got Sprint and then returned them 3 days later because I had no reception at home. Perfect reception on Cingular and its the same plans as Sprint as well. Free long distance calling mainland and no roaming charges.

TO ALL PEOPLE RELOCATING HERE: USE CINGULAR!!!!! trust me....

Actually, we haven't had any problems in the past but this time it was a problem after the storm. We had to purchase roaming for our house in PODunk Missouri. Of course, we're not living there since we're moving to Egypt.

We're hoping to use our Vonage phone in Egypt and not have any long distance charges. We've been told that as long as we have broadband service we can use our phone. Anyone with any experience??

I have to retract, I tried using my Sprint phone today with no success. It dropped my calls as soon as I got it ringing. This was in areas that it normally works. Our cingular is working fine. (We already had Sprint, but my husband's work uses Cingular - the reason we have both)

Teresa (in STT)