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All other Modes (including several Weak Signal
Digital modes) Failed to Connect the San Diego EOC to the Imperial County EOC
during the SET.
Doc:
You were so hung up in your theoretical analysis
that you missed the point....
Basically there was no HF/VHF/UHF propagation path
directly between the two EOC's during the test. Plus the path is difficult
at best of times due to intervening mountain ranges. They had hoped HF
Sideband and HF Digital would bridge the gap...but the propagation gods were
against them...
Winlink was not planned to be included in the
SET. Winlink was tried as a total afterthought (because like you the EOC
managers were very skeptical of Winlink and strongly resisted its installation)
when all other modes failed..... I have been lead to believe that the EOC
Managers were hoping to use this as an opportunity to prove that Winlink would
also be useless in the SET Scenario.
Winlink worked by connecting on HF through a node
over a thousand miles away in Texas that was able to AUTOMATICALLY relay the
messages to the Imperial County EOC.
As I was out in the field at the time, and do not
have first hand knowledge, but I believe that Imperial County EOC was connecting
through a different Winlink Node.
Frankly.. the EOC managers were shocked that
Winlink was the only mode that worked when all else failed...as they had
expected Winlink to fail... and frankly the real world success has made a number
of them into Winlink converts.
Doc:
I loved your theoretical analysis of the
situation..
but the Bottom Line Real World results in the
Simulated Emergency Test which was designed by the EOC Managers to simulate the
effects of a 7.9 earthquake as realistically as they possibly
could...
... showed that Winlink Worked...
__________________________________________________________ Howard S.
White Ph.D. P. Eng., VE3GFW/K6 ex-AE6SM KY6LA Website: www.ky6la.com "No Good Deed Goes
UnpuAmanished" "Ham Antennas Save Lives - Katrina, 2003 San Diego Fires,
911"
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, February 23, 2006 7:14
AM
Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Re: NTS and
traffic handling and digital
> The point I am making is that us hams have a
lot
> of tools in our EMCOMM arsenals.. and using this
>
irrational hatred of Winlink...to discard one
> of our tools makes no
sense...
I am unaware of anyone suggesting Winlink
being
"discarded". That is a red herring.
The points I made,
and they were intentionally
precise, were:
1. Were any other
weak-signal digital modes tested?
Winlink is one of many, and one of the
most complex.
Why test only the most expensive and the most
complex
rather than several different digital modes?
2. In
proper emergency communications planning one
*always* seeks the most
commonly available, least
complex, and most effective mode(s) for
communication.
There is no evidence that such was done re. digital
modes
in this case.
3. Winlink was not listed as to be "discarded",
only
as not the wise choice as a top-tier tool. Nothing
presented
in your reaction/reply has in the slightest
way factually argued against
that assertion.
There are standards and science which are
supposed
to guide professional and wise decision making for
emergency
communications.
The assertion that Winlink is (or was) the only
and
best mode simply fails to meet the standard. That
Winlink was
the *only* weak-signal digital mode tested
makes an entirely different
statement having nothing
to do superiority and something else to do
with
skewing the playing field.
How about inviting operators of
several different
digital modes to the test. Then using
real-world
probabilities postulate equipment failure. It
is
impossible to not find a higher probability that
necessary pairs of
rare Winlink stations at both
critical ends will either not be in place or
suffer
some sort of failure then one of the more common
(due primarily
to cost) and more reliable (due
primarily to simplicity) digital modes will
really
be there when things really get ugly.
Let me
illustrate.
If one does a test that says that one must complete
a
relay of a package across difficult terrain and
the vehicles chosen are two
each Chevy S10's (SSB Voice),
Honda Accords (CW), SUVs (complete VHF/UHF FM
Repeater
Link system), and Hummer H2s.
Those vehicles would need to
be in precise positions
(the equivalent of EOC's) prior to the suddenly
declared
relay. They would have to be fully fueled, manned
by
competent drivers, and absent mechanical problems.
One would face
a series of serious challenges.
Winlink, like the Hummer H2, is rare
and the probability
that sufficient hardware/software combinations at
both
ends (and "both ends" is an unpredictable because EOC's
may be
breached by an earthquake or terrorist attack)
when needed with antennas
and power and everything
required is highly improbable in a properly
designed
scenario.
Furthermore, due to the complexity of Winlink
the
probability of failure in one or both of the rare
pairs required is
also high.
Just as they postulated that your vhf/uhf repeater
would
fail so they would equally have to postulate
the failure of one specific
Winlink pair being in
perfect position operating perfectly undisturbed
by
the same or some other variable.
If one postulates that the very
common (Read: redundancy)
S10s, Accords, and SUV's all failed and that two
rare Hummers
were in the right place at the right time with all
variables
intact and suffered no failures (in spite of the
complexity
and in spite of no redundancy due to cost) one has
postulated
an absurdity.
Consider the many other far more common
digital modes
and one sees clearly the fallacy of the
Winlink/Hummer
postulate. In emergency/mission-critical
planning
redundancy is king.
These are simple and indisputable facts
that no
emergency management professional may ignore unless
he wants to
end up like the former FEMA Director.
IMHO, YMMV ... 73, doc
kd4e
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DigiPol: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Digipol (band plan policy discussion)
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