Expressions about a phone call and its quality

Question

I was listening to a radio program and there was an interview going on over the phone between the anchor and the listener. But I heard a disturbing sound from the phone call and the anchor said,

"Well, it looks like your signal is being dropped out there."

Something like this... (My words here could be wrong! I just combined the words from my shredded memories.)

Then the phone call was recovering again, it seemed—but after a few seconds, the anchor decided to hang up the phone because the voice of the listener could no longer be heard. And the anchor used this kind of expression.

"I think I'm losing on your line. Unfortunately I have to hang up the phone, but I still want to hear your story, please give us text...."

...It was something like this.

I remember these expressions because I thought they were nice ones, which I haven't thought of before. But I couldn't remember the exact wording. I googled those expressions, and I realized that this kind of expression is very popular.

"Wi-Fi keeps dropping on my laptop."

But, I didn't find any matches when I searched for "signal is being dropped out" or "lose on someone's line".

Please help me recover my memory and identify the exact expression. Similar expressions would be greatly appreciated as well!!

FYI, the radio was ABC news Brisbane, Australia.

Answer 1

Your question relates to appropriate agreement in figures of speech, specifically in a telecommunications signal or telecommunications connection.

Here are some examples of possible word constructions, based on the words you provided:

a caller on the line

lose a call/caller

lose a connection/signal

line/connection/signal is not stable

line/connection/signal is weak

Here are examples of these (above) in sentences such as you provided:

" Well, it looks like your signal is weak out there."

" Well, it looks like your call could get dropped out there."

"I think I'm losing you on the line."

"I think I'm losing you."

drop has special, even legal, meaning and refers to maintaining a signal or connection in telecommunications...

dropped call (Economic Times, TRAI)

Definition of call drop as per TRAI is, "Call drop represents the service provider's inability to maintain a call once it has been correctly established i.e. call dropped or interrupted prior to its normal completion by the user, the cause of the early termination being within the service provider's network."

The carrier is the "Subject" of the verb and does the actual "dropping". So, for your laptop and WiFi, your laptop doesn't drop the WiFi, the WiFi [router] drops your laptop [connection].

Examples of "dropped call" in sentences:

The call dropped.

My WiFi signal/connection dropped.

WiFi keeps dropping my laptop/connection.

Mobile/Cell service keeps dropping my calls.

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Further consideration...

These do need to be used correctly to avoid confusion. For example, "drop a line" means to give someone a brief message, not lose a call. Likewise, we don't "march a dog", we "walk a dog"; "marching [someone]" usually means making someone walk by force.

Of course, if you want an exact phrase from what was said on the radio that day, you would need a manuscript or recording from Brisbane, Australia's ABC News. But, that would be beyond our scope and purpose here.

Answer 2

"We've got a bad connection." Pre-dates cell and wireless and refers to when calls were actually connected.

Answer 3

If the listener's voice was getting worse then the anchor could have said "I think you are losing your phone's signal" or "your signal seems to be quite poor so your audio is choppy". There is no historical expression as such about this scenario since mobile phones haven’t been around for long. Essentially the anchor would like to convey to the listener that his voice is not coming across quite clear and this might be due to the fact that his phone is in a location of poor mobile network coverage. This only applies to mobile phones since a landline cannot 'lose its signal' (it is wired). "I think I'm losing on your line." → Incorrect on so many levels and can be reworded as "i think i am losing you" "Wifi keeps dropping on my laptop" → Technically incorrect and can be rephrased as "I (or my laptop) keeps on losing the wifi signal"

Thanks!