Telephone Wire line Height Above Roadways

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Thank you for the join up. Curious about the telephone, TV cable, and electrical power supply lines with respect to their minimum required height above the public roadways and highways. We had an incident in Virginia with a broken Verizon telephone line. The on scene police officer measured our load height at 15, 2". This is a maintained and divided state highway. Oddly enough we were transporting a Verizon boom truck. This particular boom joint faced forward and had a smooth diameter of 12". Of course any nick in the boom knuckle could have snagged the wire and broke it. The wire was somewhat obscured and not noticed by the operator..

My stand is the wire was hung lower than the allowance and it being July, warmer temperature could have caused additional sag in the run. We were over height but permitted for this application. Now, Verizon requests nearly $3000 for repairs so I'm doing homework on where we might stand for liability. Obviously the offending wire must have been some unknown height but lower than 15' 2". Couple of sage friends jokingly say add it to the next Verizon tow bill. The bill is not the problem. The real problem is if the carrier rolls over and pays off the Verizon claim, well will have a hit on our now un-blemished Loss-Run history. Thanks for your time. R/Tom
 
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Dennis Alwon

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The NEC requires 18' for our power cables when it is over roads, public streets etc. However the cable & Telephone cables are always lower. Unfortunately I am guessing that the NEC is not in question here but rather a utility rule. If this cable is the ones going to a home that is one thing but if they are the cables going from utility pole to utility pole then that is different.
 

GoldDigger

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Placerville, CA, USA
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Retired PV System Designer

Looks like WV specifies 18' for anything that crosses the traveled way. Not completely relevant for the rest of Virginia. :)
In some other code section there should also be instructions on what height underpass, overpass, or other obstruction requires warning signs in advance.
Quite a difference from 15' even allowing for sag.
There are nationwide standards available which some states adopt, while others like California write their own.
 

mivey

Senior Member
Required height is 15.5 ft over roadways with truck traffic. NESC Table 231-1 row 2, column 1.
 

Cavie

Senior Member
Location
SW Florida
Thank you for the join up. Curious about the telephone, TV cable, and electrical power supply lines with respect to their minimum required height above the public roadways and highways. We had an incident in Virginia with a broken Verizon telephone line. The on scene police officer measured our load height at 15, 2". This is a maintained and divided state highway. Oddly enough we were transporting a Verizon boom truck. This particular boom joint faced forward and had a smooth diameter of 12". Of course any nick in the boom knuckle could have snagged the wire and broke it. The wire was somewhat obscured and not noticed by the operator..

My stand is the wire was hung lower than the allowance and it being July, warmer temperature could have caused additional sag in the run. We were over height but permitted for this application. Now, Verizon requests nearly $3000 for repairs so I'm doing homework on where we might stand for liability. Obviously the offending wire must have been some unknown height but lower than 15' 2". Couple of sage friends jokingly say add it to the next Verizon tow bill. The bill is not the problem. The real problem is if the carrier rolls over and pays off the Verizon claim, well will have a hit on our now un-blemished Loss-Run history. Thanks for your time. R/Tom

Anything lower than 15'5" over the roadway is fair game open season. It's not up to you to engineer the temp sag
.
 

K8MHZ

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Michigan. It's a beautiful peninsula, I've looked
Occupation
Electrician
We had an incident in Virginia with a broken Verizon telephone line. The on scene police officer measured our load height at 15, 2". This is a maintained and divided state highway. Oddly enough we were transporting a Verizon boom truck.

Now that's funny!

Especially if you have ever done any work for Verizon and have experienced some of their screw ups.

Which I have, but this story is one of the best!
 
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