|
|It strikes me that the contribution of ham radio operators in a disaster
|is changing.

There are localized emergencies.
There are regional and national disasters.

Two different animals that require different levels of response.

I don't see the need for extra radio channels going away anytime soon.

Those fancy DHS grant mobile communications centers on wheels are neat.
Typically they bring together fire, EMS, police comms at a single site
with an interoperatability black box to tie it all together.....

When the action is nowhere near a working Nextel tower or public
service repeater site and the satellite links are maxxed out and the
local telco can not climb a pole to jack them into the Internet or POTS
Amateur Radio technology will see action.

The biggest problems with the roving radio comm centers is desense.
With all the antennas ganged up on the roof of such a small area they
take each others radios out every time the other one transmits.

Steve
N2UBP