Phone networks struggle in Hurricane Katrina's wake

Wed Aug 31 08:02:40 UTC 2005

Fergie (Paul Ferguson) wrote:

> Telephone companies struggled to restore service 

FYI - if you are trying to reach someone in the impacted area who has a 
cell phone but you can't get thru because "all circuits are busy" then 
give SMS a try.  I exchanged 8 SMS messages[1] between 15:58 and 16:21 
PDT today with a friend in Baton Rouge that I had been unable to contact 
via email or phone since after the storm passed.  SMS went straight thru 
with no noticeable delays.  If your contact has a working cell phone 
(hasn't run the battery dead or gotten it wet) within reach of a working 
cell tower, you may be able to at least get word that they are OK.

jc

[1]  A brief summary regarding conditions in Baton Rouge (BR):

"Kind of Crazy in BR but nothing damagewise like in NO and in 
Mississippi.  We have a large number of our NO employees who evacuated 
to our BR office.  They cannot return home - they can't even start 
repairs there until the water is pumped so they are helping us restore 
service to the BR area.  For the latest info see the Katrina Blog at 
wwltv.com."