Ham radio operators have not served any useful purpose in emergency
communications for a long time. The professionals pretty much ignore
them. At most they talk to one-another in health and welfare nets and
if someone actually calls in with an emergency all hell breaks loose
because everyone wants to talk personally with the ham calling in.

Hams have this vision of themselves as the emergency communicators who
while huddled in a dark storm beaten shack will get through to the
outside world and save the day by using a car battery and some
jury-rigged cw setup. And the hams on the outside see themselves as
the unique link on the other end who will alert the authorities and
direct them to the site before anyone else can because they alone have
a connection with the emergency site. It's little more than mental
masturbation folks 'cause the real world doesn't work that way.

During the first few days after Hurricane Wilma in south Florida, power was
down for 98 percent of the population of Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach
counties. After the power went down, regular phone service in most areas
died, cell phone towers were inoperable. When a medical emergency occurred,
there were only two ways to get help: Physically transport the patient to
the hospital, or find a ham radio operator. In retrospect, emergency
services in south Florida were caught with their pants down. Police and fire
departments either had generators that refused to start because of poor
maintenance, or no generators at all. Bell South relied on storage batteries
in remote distribution points, that were drained before the first day was
finished.

Ham operators may not have the best emergency communications abilities, but
when a widespread disaster occurs, they are the first ones to get a message
out.