Federal Agents Comb Nashville Bomb Site as Telecom Outages Stall City

The Christmas Day explosion that rocked Nashville caused considerable disruption, as it damaged a critical piece of the broader area’s telecommunications infrastructure. One of the major lines of inquiry was whether there was significance in the location of the blast: on a downtown street in front of an AT&T transmission building. The explosion created significant damage to the facility, causing widespread repercussions to telecommunication systems in Nashville and beyond. Officials said the outages have affected 911 operations and flights at Nashville International Airport. Across the region, residents and businesses lost cellphone service and internet connections, and many were still experiencing issues on Saturday. AT&T has installed portable cell sites in downtown Nashville to alleviate some of the outages, the company said. Workers were drilling access holes into the building and trying to restore power to equipment essential to resuming service. The explosion affected some cell service across parts of Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama, and hindered the communication of 20 or more 911 call centers. The Federal Aviation Administration temporarily halted flights out of the Nashville International Airport because of telecommunications issues caused by the blast. Shoppers at some retail outlets had to pay with cash or checks as sellers could not access credit card systems.