For decades, telecom structures have largely been designed around the 1-in-50-year storm event. It has been a reliable benchmark, balancing safety, constructability, and cost. But are the environmental assumptions we design to, still represented in the world our structures now operate in? With increasingly frequent extreme weather events, the idea of rare storms is beginning to feel less rare.
Wind is not the only concern. Snow loads, in particular, are becoming harder to dismiss as static, predictable values. In regions where snowfall was once moderate, we are now seeing significantly heavier accumulations and longer periods before melt. Antennas, mounts, dishes, as well as the rooftops these structures are installed on, create ideal conditions for snow deposition, often resulting in uneven and amplified loading that was never fully anticipated in older design philosophies. What was once considered conservative can, in some cases, now be barely adequate. Will there be a need to reassess the partial safety factors on this regard?
This naturally raises the question of whether a shift toward a 1-in-75-year or even 1-in-100-year storm criterion should be considered, at least for certain sites or structure types. Such a shift would significantly improve structural resilience, but it would also have clear implications for design return periods and overall project costs. This trade-off is particularly challenging in an industry that is under constant pressure to deliver faster and cheaper. The key issue, therefore, is determining where increased robustness is genuinely warranted and where it may be considered an unnecessary overdesign.
Rather than offering a definitive answer, this is a conversation worth having openly within the engineering community. Are current codes and standards evolving quickly enough to reflect the changing environmental realities? As we continue to design structures expected to stand for decades, it may be time to reassess whether our definition of extreme still matches the world outside our calculations.
KAEG are at the forefront of providing cost-effective design solutions for telecom structures to ensure continuous safe operations. Contact our expert team at: info@ka-engroup.com to learn more and discuss how we can best serve your needs.