Keeping Connected

There was great excitement in the Flum neighbourhood this morning, when an enooorrmous crane appeared as if by magic in the cul-de-sac. Even more exciting was watching the boom turn 180°, swinging right over the garden where Mr Flum was busy picking up the trimmings from the hedge-cutting. It missed the house, fortunately. We'd had no warning, so what what was all about?

The crane lifted an orange cage and, drawing it close to the upright,  swung it 180° back and over to the telegraph pole behind the garden (bumping into it once or twice), whereupon the technician began to unhook all the telephone wires. Yup, all the BT wires, those that people use to make phone calls and that get in the way of all the photos. You can see mine and our left-hand neighbour's hanging from the cage, with two either side still attached.

The man was in shouting distance by then so Mr Flum had a chat and we learned that the copper wiring was to be replaced by fibre-optic and the connections were being updated in preparation. 

Next, with the telephone wires apparently left draped over the various trees, entire telegraph pole was lifted away, to be replaced by a spanking new one, without the horizontal bars and insulators, just a couple of tufty things at the top. No suspended cage this time, Mr technician climbed the pole on the regular supports to work on the re-attachment process. As we don't use BT at present we could have declined having the wire re-attached but, hey, who can tell if in the future we might change our minds.

We then admired the engineering design by which the crane folded itself up and tucked itself away onto its lorry, and stabilisers released. Just needed the umpteen support vehicles (including the pole-carrying lorry) to assemble into a convoy and all ready to go.