I dont think that anyone believes that you can completely kill off the Internet in its entirity; however, certainly certain sections/rather large geographical areas could loose connectivity for several hours even for perhaps a day.
The question is what do amateur radio operators do during that time? Would we really have time to respond before normal Internet service was restored? If you read the computer/IT magazines written for government agencies, you will see that the government's network folks ARE concerned about losing parts of their network and others at the same time being overloaded. In a free and open society, I don't think telling people to stay off E-Mail to aunt Sally or browse the web is really going to keep people off the Internet. They will still want to be downloadind or streaming their favorite movie, etc. Some have suggested that IPv6 can take care of this by assigning proprity IP addresses for emergency and disaster services as well as public service services. In this way if your IP address wasn't considered "necessary", then you would not get out/off of you local network. Walt/K5YFW Rick wrote: > Quite a few emergency planners are counting on the internet staying > operational except in the immediate disaster area. As an example, our > ARRL Section leader wants members to move all digital to Winlink 2000 > and is focusing most resources to developing an interlinked repeater > system for voice and digital although I have not heard how this is being > done. They even have "nets" that work through Winlink 2000 since many > ARES members are Technician class licensees and can not operate lower > (NVIS) HF bands with voice or digital. > > While there are fewer and fewer chances of losing telecommunications > infrastructure for very long, it does occur. At that point, many of > these systems may not function since they are based upon many things > continuing to work. Some of the more foresightful emergency planners > (not necessarily ARES/RACES) in my area, realize that even repeaters are > not a sure thing either and have actually done exercises over > multi-county distances without them. > > Do you really see much of a use for CW, other than longer distance > messaging, perhaps via NTS? Even that is rarely done from the little > traffic that I tend to see coming out of disaster areas. There may or > may not be a simultaneous communications emergency, so that changes the > calculus too. Other than myself, I would be hard pressed to list any > other hams in my county who have at least some CW skill and are involved > with emergency communication. > > There are several things that I want to explore in the coming year: > > - whether or not the ARQ PSK modes will be competitive with ARQ ALE/FAE > 400. Maybe both? Maybe the developers who will be coming up with a > Windows version of flarq could consider other modulation waveforms? > > - how effective will 2 meter SSB work between mobiles and base stations > using voice and digital modes compared to HF NVIS operation. Even with > extremely difficult terrain such as we have in this area. > > 73, > > Rick, KV9U > > > > W2XJ wrote: > >>I think anything that depends on interconnected infrastructure is >>vulnerable in an emergency. In a real emergency SSB AM FM and CW are the >>only viable modes that you know will work. Everyone likes to tout >>emergencies and homeland security to support whatever position they wish >>to champion. When the real thing occurs and the established >>infrastructure fails and amateur radio is needed, you can bet it will be >>with basic modes. >> >> >> >>Walt DuBose wrote: >> >> >>>Sending Internet E-Mail over amateur radio frequencies has a place >>>especially in >>>emergency, disaster relief and training use or where normal communications >>>are >>>NOT available as long as its use (E-mail via amateur radio) does use >>>circumvent >>>the normal use of normal internet capabilities...I admit this paraphrased >>>from >>>the U.S. FCC Part 97 but is common sense. >>> >>>Do do admit that sending long files and tieing up a frequency for a long >>>period >>>of time is bad...not very amateur radio like while probably not an FCC Part >>>97 >>>violation but certainly a bad operating practice. >>> >>>And in emergency or disaster communications you really want to make you >>>messages >>>as simple and short as possible editing forwarded messages and not attaching >>>large files unless absolutelly necessarly...i.e. convert MS Word files to >>>HTML >>>or better yet ASCII files where possible. >>> >>>73, >>> >>>Walt/K5YFW >>>
