Telstra will next week be upgrading its mobile base station in Mount Isa by adding additional infrastructure to bring better 4G services to the community, however the works will require a series of temporary outages a reduction in mobile coverage.
These improvements will temporarily impact Telstra mobile coverage at various times during daylight hours from November 15 - 22.
Landline services, NBN internet services and mobile coverage from other providers will not be impacted. Any calls to Triple Zero from a Telstra mobile when the site is off air will automatically be diverted to any working mobile network for connection to emergency services.
Regional General Manager for Telstra, Rachel Cliffe, said while crews need to work during daylight for safety, they'll only be switching off the site when they need to and will have it back on as quickly as possible.
"Where possible we will just be switching off the parts of the tower we are working on, leaving the rest operational. While coverage and capacity will decline during this time, we want to keep the amount of time the site is off air to an absolute minimum.
"There's never a good time to undertake this sort of work but once it is completed, it will mean better mobile services for local residents," Rachel said.
"Telstra does have other mobile base stations located close by in Fisher which may help provide some coverage on the outskirts of town, but most of our mobile coverage for this area comes from this base station so there will be an impact. As a company, we heavily invest in improving regional connectivity... with $4b of this invested in our regional mobile network."
