scope:

Telecommunications Facilities Covered

The purpose of this standard is to describe measures that provide a baseline level of protection for the interconnecting links (Figure 17.1) of telecommunications networks against typical geographic and local environmental conditions. The measures are intended to help provide protection from damage caused by specific physical stresses and radiation effects.

The protection measures of this standard apply to the telecommunications links that interconnect environmentally controlled centers of telecommunications networks including feeder and local distribution plant. The links are optical fiber, metallic-conductor, or coaxial cables of trunk, feeder, and local distribution plant. They include connections and repeater points that are on towers, antennas, poles, or in manholes and pedestals, and that are not necessarily environmentally controlled. The terminations of the links in environmentally controlled structures and their power sources are included, but the structures themselves and their contents are excluded.

The standard addresses protection against such physical threats as: vibration, water penetration, temperature, fire, lightning, wind, ice, construction stresses, corrosion, loss of telecommunications power systems, and radiation effects. The radiation effects encompass electromagnetic interference from transmitting antennas, solar activity, and limited nuclear disaster (e.g., nuclear power plant failure).

Application of Protection Measures

The protection measures described in this standard are intended to be applied for installation of new telecommunications facilities, but not necessarily for repair of existing installations. The measures include information for the design and construction of aerial, buried, and underground telecommunications plant, and apply to all providers of telecommunications networks, including but not limited to exchange carriers and interexchange carriers (see Figure 17.1).

Not every telecommunications link requires the same degree of protection from the various physical stresses. This baseline standard shall be coordinated with local codes, which may dictate more stringent requirements. This baseline standard is intended to establish foundation-level protection from damage due to physical stress and radiation under typical geographic and local environmental conditions.

Items Not Covered

Central office and similar-type environmentally controlled structures that contain telecommunications centers are not included in this standard. Customer detailed site-specific measures are beyond the scope of this standard and are subject to negotiation between user and supplier. The measures described in this standard apply at the facility level, and do not provide techniques for the protection of specific network equipment or components.

These measures do not apply to telecommunications links serving specialized locations, such as the high-voltage environment that may be encountered at power-generating stations and substations.