Zippyjuan
11-01-2012, 11:58 AM
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/tech/weather-economy/send-phone-drones
Send in the phone drones
There is nothing like a superstorm to make two cellphone competitors play nice-nice. AT&T and T-Mobile say they have temporarily jury-rigged their network in parts of the Northeast so that customers who can't reach their normal cellphone connection can use the rival's tower without extra charge.
It is a response to the hurricane, with the FCC's latest assessment showing more than one in four cell sites remain offline from Virginia through Massachusetts. At a briefing Wednesday, FCC Public Safety & Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Turetsky said regulators are still gathering data on how many telephone landlines are out.
"Because of the flooding, the carriers haven't been able to assess the damage to their wire line services," Turetsky said. "So that's really an ongoing effort."
When communication towers lie toppled or flooded following a big storm or other disaster, wouldn't it be nice if somebody could fly in a temporary replacement? Government regulators are working on the idea of doing this using unmanned drones without the weaponry to get disaster communications up and running. A California company, AeroVironment has something that looks very much like a model airplane that launches with a toss of the hand.
Our small unmanned aircraft systems come already equipped with a digital communication technology that basically allows them to operate like mini communications satellites only a few hundred feet above the ground," says AeroVironment's Steve Gittin, "they can route voice video and data so emergency communication can be stood up very rapidly after a disasters."
Bigger drones might some day be able to handle temporary cell phone communication.
Send in the phone drones
There is nothing like a superstorm to make two cellphone competitors play nice-nice. AT&T and T-Mobile say they have temporarily jury-rigged their network in parts of the Northeast so that customers who can't reach their normal cellphone connection can use the rival's tower without extra charge.
It is a response to the hurricane, with the FCC's latest assessment showing more than one in four cell sites remain offline from Virginia through Massachusetts. At a briefing Wednesday, FCC Public Safety & Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Turetsky said regulators are still gathering data on how many telephone landlines are out.
"Because of the flooding, the carriers haven't been able to assess the damage to their wire line services," Turetsky said. "So that's really an ongoing effort."
When communication towers lie toppled or flooded following a big storm or other disaster, wouldn't it be nice if somebody could fly in a temporary replacement? Government regulators are working on the idea of doing this using unmanned drones without the weaponry to get disaster communications up and running. A California company, AeroVironment has something that looks very much like a model airplane that launches with a toss of the hand.
Our small unmanned aircraft systems come already equipped with a digital communication technology that basically allows them to operate like mini communications satellites only a few hundred feet above the ground," says AeroVironment's Steve Gittin, "they can route voice video and data so emergency communication can be stood up very rapidly after a disasters."
Bigger drones might some day be able to handle temporary cell phone communication.