Old Technology Still Needed

There is a store in London dedicated to "appropriate technology." It mostly carries products designed to be used in developing countries where there is a weak communications infrastructure.

Sadly, that's now the case for a large swath of the United States where Hurricane Katrina and its flood waters have wiped out cell phone towers, telephone switching stations, Internet routers and other ground-based communications systems. Even wireless Internet depends on nearby transmitters and receivers on the ground.

But amateur radio is working and, according to Allen Pitts of the Amateur Radio Relay League (ARRL), "ham" radio operators from throughout the country are answering the call to provide vital communications links. Satellite phones, a much newer technology, are also coming to the rescue.

Pitts acknowledges that cell phones and other technologies "work wonderfully when everything is going right," but "they are very vulnerable when everything is going wrong."

Just as with past hurricanes, earthquakes and on September 11th, the ground-based infrastructure, in many cases failed because vital parts of the system were damaged or overwhelmed during the emergency.

In other words, when you need them most, those cell phones are of no value.

Amateur radio, says Pitts, is not vulnerable to these problems "because each of the radio operators is a complete transmit and reception center unto themselves able to continue going and continue with nothing more than an electrical source, such as a battery or a generator, a radio and piece of wire for an antenna."

While base-station radios are larger and require an electrical power source, there are also portable ham radios slightly larger than a pack of cigarettes with a range of about 20 miles, according to Pitts. Pitts says that the next sized radio, about the size of a paperback book, can communicate up to about 50 miles without a repeater while larger systems, "about the size of a desktop computer" can communicate globally.

Amateur radio operators are in demand. When I checked the ARRL's Web site there was a call from the Salvation Army for "10, two-operator Amateur Radio teams for deployment in the U.S. Gulf Coast. Operators must hold at least a General class license. Teams should be fully self sufficient in terms of food, water and lodging and plan to remain in the disaster area for from one to two weeks."

Pitts said there was a "lady in Connecticut," who was listening on her amateur radio and happened to hear that there was a woman "who was trapped for four days without food and water." She was able to relay that message, by ham radio, into an operations center that dispatched the fire department. A day later she got a call from the trapped woman's mother, thanking her for her role in the rescue.

Ironically, this comes at a time when amateur radio is struggling for respect and, to some extent, survival. What was once a popular hobby has fallen into somewhat hard times for a variety of reasons, including the fact that the Internet, cheap long distance calling, cell phones and other technologies make the ability to use these two-way radios not quite as compelling as it once was.

Also, there is a bit of a rift between some members of the amateur radio community and some parts of the Internet industry over the use of power lines to transmit Internet signals. This technology, which could put power companies into competition with cable and phone companies for broadband service, has been criticized by some ham operators because of possible interference problems.

Despite the fact that their origins go back to the early 20th century, hams are hardly low-tech. There are now bridges between ham operators and other technologies including the Internet, cellular phone systems and Internet phones. In fact, long before the Internet became popular, ham operators were using their radio gear to transmit data along with voice and morse code.

Also coming to the rescue are satellite phones. These phones – which are much more expensive to buy and use than cell phones – rely on satellites rather than ground equipment to communicate with the phone network.

Because satellites are in space, they're not vulnerable to conditions here on earth. Also, as long as you have a view of the sky, you're able to communicate. Iridium, which operates "66 low-earth orbiting (LEO), cross-linked satellites and 11 in-orbit spares," says it provides "complete coverage of the earth (including oceans, airways and Polar Regions)."

I carried an Iridium phone with me when I traveled to Peru a few years ago. It worked great when I was in the clear such as on a boat in the middle of the Amazon River but, because it requires a line of site view of the sky, it had problems in dense jungle and in cities with tall buildings.

Iridium spokesperson Liz DeCastro estimates that there are currently about 10,000 of Iridium's phones being used in the region with orders for about 6,000 more. The company sells through resellers so it doesn't have exact numbers. DeCastro says that "traffic in the region increased by 3,000 percent" since the storm hit and that the number of subscribers increased by 500 percent.

Satellite phones are a lot cheaper to use then when I went to Peru, but they still cost between $1 and $1.25 per minute to use, according to DeCastro. That's a lot more than domestic cell use, though often cheaper than using U.S. phones when roaming overseas. The phones themselves cost between $1,000 and $1,500 she says.

In addition to handling voice calls, satellite phones can also be used for messaging or data, albeit at modem rather than broadband speed.

If anything, Katrina has taught us the value of redundancy. The best way to make sure that messages get through is to have standby systems that can take over when others fail.

That's why some news organizations keep manual typewriters around. You never know when that old technology may suddenly become the "appropriate technology."