It wasn’t a bird, plane or even Superman hovering through the skies of Ball Ground, GA – just outside of Atlanta – this week.  Rather, a crew from AT&T was set up for the day at a small airstrip testing a new flying COW!  Of course, we’re not talking about your traditional barnyard variety, but rather a 40 pound drone designed to quickly and more efficiently deliver mobile phone and Internet coverage in areas impacted by a disaster.
 
Georgia, as we all know, is certainly not immune from severe weather impacts – including tornadoes, tropical storms, hurricanes, floods, and even ice storms – all of which can temporarily knock out mobile Internet and phone connectivity.  Currently, in the event of a natural disaster where cell sites are damaged or knocked offline, AT&T will deploy mobile cell sites on trucks to provide coverage to folks affected.  But now we’re going a step further…
 
AT&T has essentially attached a cell tower to a drone to provide coverage in the event of a natural disaster. And this week, we became the first wireless company to test this revolutionary technology.
 
By creating a cell tower on a drone, activation of a backup cell signal will be much faster, have closer access to the affected areas and more flexible deployment. The flying COW carries texts, calls, and data over satellite. That means it can operate in extremely remote areas and does not depend on available wired or wireless infrastructure.
 
In addition, the drone can fly at altitudes over 300 feet, about 500% higher than a traditional Cell on Wheels or Cell on Light Truck mast.  One can provide coverage to an area up to 40 square miles—about the size of a 100 football fields. Instead of a cell on wheels ... we call this a Cell on WINGS.
 
The flight test actually took place in a “dead zone” over Ball Ground, so AT&T set up a COLT truck onsite to provide coverage before the drone was deployed.
 
Once the drone was in place, the truck’s satellite was switched off and everyone lost signal. Then the drone was activated and everyone immediately regained coverage... demonstrating the method in which lost cell service is immediately restored from the flying COW above. Please see attached video and photo links, and feel free to call on me with any additional questions...
 
Assets:

Stills: http://qlnk.io/ql/58a4b042e4b0a2da09607678 and http://qlnk.io/ql/58a4d3cbe4b0fb00e950f80f (FYI, these were taken from a drone flying simultaneously with the Flying COW)

Video: http://qlnk.io/ql/58a4d8d5e4b0b9156de67fc5 (a mixture of a cameraperson on the ground and also video taken from a second drone)