When Winter Storm Jonas buried the East Coast this weekend, it dumped feet of snow on the majority of Verizon’s Fios territory. The result? Most of our customers were stuck at home all weekend, leading to record traffic numbers on the Fios network.
At its peak, the network handled almost 40 percent more data on Saturday than we typically see on a weekend day. Sunday’s numbers were almost as impressive and would have been a record themselves if the day of the actual blizzard wasn’t higher.
We also saw record Fios TV Video on Demand (VOD) requests on Saturday with 50 percent higher demand than a typical Saturday and 20 percent higher than our previous busiest day. VOD numbers are also a fun indicator of when a local NFL team is playing. For example, on Sunday, VOD demand was still up from the previous week in all Northeast Fios markets, except for Boston/Providence, where the New England Patriots were playing at the Denver Broncos in the AFC Championship Game.
While we certainly don’t wish another blizzard the magnitude of Jonas on our customers, we do want them to know, that the next time they’re stuck at home when they’d otherwise be out having fun, the nation’s largest 100 percent fiber-optic network will be there to help fend off the boredom.