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Communications Infrastructure No Match for Katrina
jfourier writes "In this age of cheap commoditized consumer electronics and advanced mobile technology, why can't all the people of a city make contact during an emergency? Cell phone circuits filled up during 9/11 attacks and in the wake of hurricane Katrina very few victims can make contact with their families, despite the fact that they have all those mobile phones. The Red Cross is looking to deploy satellite equipment to restore communications in affected areas." From the article: "Katrina made landfall in Louisiana early this morning with sustained winds of 145 mph, but veered just enough to the east to spare New Orleans a direct blow. Even so, flooding, power outages and heavy damage to structures were reported throughout the region.
The Red Cross tomorrow expects to begin deploying a host of systems it will need, including satellite telephones, portable satellite dishes, specially equipped communications trucks, high- and low-band radio systems, and generator-powered wireless computer networks, said Jason Wiltrout, a Red Cross network engineer. "
https://www.redcross.org/donate/donation-form.asp
1-800-HELP-NOW
Let me point out that this is one of those times when battery operated amateur radio provides one of the best ways to get messages in and out of an affected area. In fact, this story at the ARRL has some information on how hams are helping in the recovery effort.
-Crow T. Trollbot
http://www.arrl.org/
Amateur Radio Volunteers Involved in Katrina Recovery (Aug 30, 2005) -- Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) volunteers in Louisiana are engaged in the Hurricane Katrina recovery effort, and more are waiting in the wings to help as soon as they can enter storm-ravaged zones. Winds and flooding from the huge storm wreaked havoc in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama after Katrina came ashore early Monday, August 29. Louisiana ARES Section Emergency Coordinator Gary Stratton, K5GLS, told ARRL that some 250 ARES members have been working with the Red Cross and the state's Office of Homeland Security Emergency Preparedness. Much of the affected areas remain flooded and dangerous, however. As a result, state officials have not allowed emergency or other units to enter the flooded zones, and there is still no communication with many coastal areas.
The networks are not designed for theoretical maximum capacity, they are designed for average peak observed capacity. If there are 1 million cell phones in use and only 10-20% of them are actively transmitting at a time during normal use, why shell out for 5 times as much infrastructure as is needed to support that level of use? A catastrophe like Katrina or 9/11 only happens once every few years; the rest of the time the excess capacity would only be draining resources - not just from the corporate bottom line, but from maintaining the 10-20% of the equipment that's actually used by subscribers.
Wind no, rain yes.
Ku Band singals are in the microwave range of EM frequencies, so are vulnerable to rain fade (which is ironic since many Meteorologists get their data this way).
C-Band isn't as bad.
Wind does not affect satellite signals. It effects the dishes. Rain does attenuate the signal however. Regardless, the storm will have blown over by the time the Red Cross gets the equipment setup. All and all this was not a well thought out post: 1. Capacity : Yes, the cell companies could build out the capacity to support everyone calling at once but you don't want to foot the bill. Every once in a while you need to speed to pass some one, you don't buy a porsche do you? Why? Because most of us justify it, much less afford it. 2. Robustness : Lets see if you house stands up to 20 feet of water and 145 mph winds. I'm certain it won't... why not... because you don't want to pay for it. Cell phones are not a public service, they are a commodity and are priced and scaled accordingly. I'm sure the cell phone companies would be more than happy to accomodate you if you'll sign the 10 year $250/month service contract.
Well, then do it - the test for No Code Tech is not very hard, and then you can start getting practice operating, and start studying for the Extra when the FCC removes the 5 words per minute Morse requirement (any day now).
Go to http://www.arrl.org/ - download the question pools (they are about to change - so get the correct ones), go by a shi^H^H^HRadio Shack and get the Tech, General, and Extra study guides, and spend a few minutes a night studying.
The ARRL should have a list of testing sessions and locations - failing that, let me know where you are and I'll see what I can find out.
www.eFax.com are spammers
In NYC after the 9/11/2001 planebombs blew up the World Trade Center, including the vast telecom infrastructure centered in 7 World Trade, phone service was crippled. But for the city government, that lasted only a couple of days. The City's IT department ("DoITT") took an in-house VoIP experiment, and prematurely deployed it to over 50,000 of the City government's 75,000 desk phones. They actually worked a few blocks from the smoke-choked Ground Zero to install telecom servers over existing TCP/IP LANs. Which gave not only dialtone, but the conferencing, connectivity and security demanded by that unprecedented crisis. The next several weeks saw the high performance of that emergency replacement, coping with the vast weight of the telecom organizing the city's recovery from the catastrophe.
New Orleans ain't New York City. I lived there, too, and I know it's hardly "Silicon Alley": It's Carbon Swamp. The telecom services there aren't really comparable to NYC's, even on leisurely good days. But the Big Easy could take a lesson from the Big Apple, just as all cities can. We proved that disaster recovery can be highly effective, and those results are available to the world. These scale disasters are becoming more frequent. People should become familiar with techniques for coping with them now, before the crisis, when planning and preparation can be done on one's own schedules, and not merely the best one can do when disaster strikes.
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make install -not war