The disaster in the Gulf coast and the less than optimal initial response suggests to me that citizens must shoulder more responsibility for emergency management. Communications loss must have played a large role in the failures that occurred. I can't help but wonder if there are fewer ham radio operators today and that if there were more, maybe they could make a difference in future emergency situations. Imagine what a network of systems composed of Asterisk, ham radio, wifi, generators, batteries, and a reserve of fuel could have done for the Gulf coast. I have all of the components above except the ham radio. I suspect there are some folks on this list that have already implemented such a system. If so, I would like to read about what they have done so I can develop a plan to participate in this network if one exists. There's not much on google for "asterisk ham". http://sourceforge.net/projects/hamlib/ http://www.radioadv.com/default.htm Thanks, -- Mike
Is there any VoIP phones available which can be plugged directly to the Ethernet network?
Hi, can you be a little clearer??? Every VoIP hardphone can be connected to Ethernet except for USB models. Giorgio Alex wrote:> Is there any VoIP phones available which can be plugged directly to > the Ethernet network? > > _______________________________________________ > --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- > > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >
try google for VoIP Phone ;-) or here: http://www.voip-info.org/tiki-index.php?page=Asterisk+phones On Wednesday 07 September 2005 11:19, Alex wrote:> Is there any VoIP phones available which can be plugged directly to the > Ethernet network? > > _______________________________________________ > --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- > > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Mike Hemstock
2005-Sep-08 12:28 UTC
[Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM
On Tuesday 06 September 2005 15:27, Mike M wrote:> The disaster in the Gulf coast and the less than optimal initial > response suggests to me that citizens must shoulder more responsibility > for emergency management. Communications loss must have played a large > role in the failures that occurred. I can't help but wonder if there > are fewer ham radio operators today and that if there were more, maybe > they could make a difference in future emergency situations. > > Imagine what a network of systems composed of Asterisk, ham radio, wifi, > generators, batteries, and a reserve of fuel could have done for the > Gulf coast. I have all of the components above except the ham radio. > > I suspect there are some folks on this list that have already > implemented such a system. If so, I would like to read about what they > have done so I can develop a plan to participate in this network if one > exists. > > There's not much on google for "asterisk ham". > > http://sourceforge.net/projects/hamlib/ > http://www.radioadv.com/default.htm > > Thanks,That's a very interesting idea. I believe radio ametures who have a radio in their car don't have to pay road tax in Canada as they one provided emergency comms during a civil emergency. Mike. 2E1HFW
Jonathan k. Creasy
2005-Sep-09 18:23 UTC
[Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM
Yeah....it's better to be a KC...we just hang out in the back and watch everyone else be wrong out loud. -Jonathan KC9FQT -----Original Message----- From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Peter Bowyer Sent: Friday, September 09, 2005 8:45 AM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM On 08/09/05, Mark Phillips <g7ltt@g7ltt.com> wrote:> Bloddy 2E's; always wrong. > > Mark G7LTT/KC2ENII know some G7s who are occasionally wrong, too :-) Peter G4MJS / 9M6BAA -- Peter Bowyer Email: peter@bowyer.org Tel: +44 1296 768003 VoIP: sip:peter@bowyer.org _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Time and time again, emergency action drills take place in cities to target where their weaknesses are in "crisis" handling. Usually they involve planes crashing or explosions (mock of course). Obviously they were never prepared for this sort of disaster in their recovery plan. I've participated in a few ARES/RACES drills and have to say that much could be done to improve upon the "HAM" infrastructure. Most of the time, communications is coordinated through 1 repeater system. When this repeater goes down, of course people would switch comms to another but in a case like this, where all the repeater systems go down except for maybe one, there needs to be a better plan. In Amateur Satellite Service, these orbiting "Repeaters" employ a system called RUDAK where a chunk of spectrum is repeated. Obviously this isn't feasible in terrestrial repeaters but they do have the ability to turn off radios and switch bands at will depending on operating conditions. With software controlled radio and Asterisk, the repeater system could be made to be more resilient to disaster by linking to other repeater systems via radio where it could connect outward. If you figure the overhead of a repeater's transmitter and receiver plus the controller, replaceing the controller with an asterisk based unit (integration) would make more sense as it would give the repeater system much more capabilities in the same footprint and power. Additionally, these repeater systems are located on hilltops with other radio systems so they should have emergency power available (if you've ever been to a hilltop repeater site, you'll know what I mean). I think the biggest thing that hurts ham radio's ability to react to a crisis is the lack of equipment and operators. Most of the traffic we pass is "Health and Welfare" with "Logistics" being the second to it. What defeats this is that in a disaster where local/high band long haul capabilities are diminished, is simply the one repeater that is functional because everything is squeezed onto one VHF/UHF repeater. Where I could see thing being improved? Installation of 802.11b/g WLAN under Part 97. It would allow for more users into the system, there are less hardware and power components and allows the system to be dynamically configured. Asterisk could play a huge role then as it's made for IP based traffic and could re-route in a split second. -Don ________________________________ From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Michael D Schelin Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2005 10:20 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM The two best forms of communications in a real disaster and one always has been is #1 Ham radio. and #2 satellite telephone. Ham radio is global and has proven time and time again to be the most reliable when the infrastructer has been damaged. The U.S government is the biggest user of satellite telephones which is also becoming a valuable tool again when the communications infrastructure is down. It would be nice If Asterisk could be used but in this case but it's useless. People are displaced and most of the communications infrastructure for the city is unusable. I don't mean all of the telco's systems. It's the flood that wiped out most home and business systems. For us, The best thing that a provider can do is to have redundant servers in different cities. This should remind us all how fragile our lives are. Chris Travers wrote: Mark Phillips wrote: Hold on here folks, I'm guessing that the original poster of this thread isn't a member of his local RAyNet team. Whilst I don't profess to be an expert at this I have been doing emergency radio for quite some time and have seen service at the Lockerbie bombing, Docklands bomb, Ground Zero (I'm sure I'm a terrorist target y'know - they seem to follow me everywhere) and soon I'll be in Louisiana. In all of these events the KISS principle must and does prevail. We need a system that is a simple and energy efficient as possible. Building a network of * servers and Wi-Fi links is all very well but how are you going to power them? These are excellent points. I have a few interesting suggestions here.... The first is that the only obstacle to any sort of longer-range point to point line is merely power. This is true whether you are talking HAM or fiberoptics. Note that if you have the power, it would take disruption of the physical line to disrupt a fiber line. Note that DirectNIC in New Orleans remained operational without *any* downtime or loss of connectivity with the rest of the world. The suggestion that I have is for various areas to have dedicated civil emergency com units with strategic reserves of fuel (3-4 weeks worth), battery backups, etc. These units would have links (fiber, microwave, and/or satellite, better to pick 2 of 3) to areas outside expected disaster zones. Asterisk could then run across these links. (Sattelite links would best be POTS-type). The point is to a disaster-tolerant communications infrastructure which could then be used to to provide additional communications services to the relief workers. With various point to point wireless capabilities, it might be possible to use them to provide cell service to relief workers etc through the installation of GSM microcells (which could be brought in after the fact). See where I am going? Generators require fuel which is always in short supply and batteries die out quickly. Adding Ham Radio to the picture doesn't really add much when you are trying to do something like a * network. The radio gear just isn't designed to integrate with the * server. Ham radio is being used down in the Katrina affected area with great results for both emergency and heath/welfare related traffic. They are using both "phone" (that's when one talks in to the radio) and data modes and can be heard all over the 75 and 40 meter bands here in the US. Power for most of these stations comes from batteries they loot (with Police approval) from abandoned cars or a combo of solar and batteries. Many stations are only hear on the air after dark so that they can put as much sunlight into their batteries as possible. Yes, electricity is available in some places either all day or across the peak hours (allowing the workmen to restore power to other areas). Yes, there are radio to phone interconnects but these really are a single phone to a single radio. Think of it as a cordless phone in that the radio user can be anywhere within reach of the base station. Such technologies, whilst legal here in the US, may not be legal elsewhere. When last at home (UK) I was not able to connect my radio to the phone system by law (this may have changed recently - not been home for 8 years). Many countries have such restrictions and as we saw during the Tsunami, rules don't get relaxed just because there's a panic on. Without question a phone system would be much better than a radio station. As such I'll be taking a portable * server I've built, all the IP hard phones I can find and 5 DirectTV style Internet systems. How do IP hardphones work with satellite internet? I always thought people had real trouble getting them to work at all..... Best Wishes, Chris Travers Metatron Tecnology Consulting ________________________________ _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.digium.com/pipermail/asterisk-users/attachments/20050911/e8ba69d6/attachment.htm
I can understand that. I'm a KL7 call so comms could mean the matter of someone getting picked up or freezing to death. It troubles me that radio site owners (the ones who hold the pink slip on the tower and hilltop) are not providing power. In AK, most of these sites are multihomed with fed, state and local radio systems so money is provided to maintain backup power. That being said, in that given area, maybe taking a cue from the Emergency Call boxes along the I-5 and I-15 and use solar panels to charge a battery backup system. That plus some power-stingy equipment could maintain a reliable radio network. Knowing that all of us on the west coast are just || close to the big one when sites like this loose power to the cellular equipment, guess who's still going to be operating? :) (not that they would be working well anyways since lines jam up) Anyways. A resiliant recovery plan that has been practiced and works will trump a "all-hands" effort anyday. -Don ________________________________ From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Michael D Schelin Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2005 2:46 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM Don, I agree with you on many fronts. I come from a radio background and here in southern cal unless we fall into the sea nothing will take out all of the communications here including ham because we are not in low lying flat land and were too diversified, over 150 miles and as many mountain top sites. BUT, let me tell you about how bad the southern CA. radio site owners are becoming. We had a 4 day outage at a very large site where one of my radios is located. None of them care anymore about backup power. This happened this past week. We took up our own Generator because the site owner (a national site company) won't maintain an old one. My friend (a microwave isp ) fixed the site owners by adding oil and a new battery. That will take us out! Don Fanning wrote: Time and time again, emergency action drills take place in cities to target where their weaknesses are in "crisis" handling. Usually they involve planes crashing or explosions (mock of course). Obviously they were never prepared for this sort of disaster in their recovery plan. I've participated in a few ARES/RACES drills and have to say that much could be done to improve upon the "HAM" infrastructure. Most of the time, communications is coordinated through 1 repeater system. When this repeater goes down, of course people would switch comms to another but in a case like this, where all the repeater systems go down except for maybe one, there needs to be a better plan. In Amateur Satellite Service, these orbiting "Repeaters" employ a system called RUDAK where a chunk of spectrum is repeated. Obviously this isn't feasible in terrestrial repeaters but they do have the ability to turn off radios and switch bands at will depending on operating conditions. With software controlled radio and Asterisk, the repeater system could be made to be more resilient to disaster by linking to other repeater systems via radio where it could connect outward. If you figure the overhead of a repeater's transmitter and receiver plus the controller, replaceing the controller with an asterisk based unit (integration) would make more sense as it would give the repeater system much more capabilities in the same footprint and power. Additionally, these repeater systems are located on hilltops with other radio systems so they should have emergency power available (if you've ever been to a hilltop repeater site, you'll know what I mean). I think the biggest thing that hurts ham radio's ability to react to a crisis is the lack of equipment and operators. Most of the traffic we pass is "Health and Welfare" with "Logistics" being the second to it. What defeats this is that in a disaster where local/high band long haul capabilities are diminished, is simply the one repeater that is functional because everything is squeezed onto one VHF/UHF repeater. Where I could see thing being improved? Installation of 802.11b/g WLAN under Part 97. It would allow for more users into the system, there are less hardware and power components and allows the system to be dynamically configured. Asterisk could play a huge role then as it's made for IP based traffic and could re-route in a split second. -Don ________________________________ From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Michael D Schelin Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2005 10:20 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM The two best forms of communications in a real disaster and one always has been is #1 Ham radio. and #2 satellite telephone. Ham radio is global and has proven time and time again to be the most reliable when the infrastructer has been damaged. The U.S government is the biggest user of satellite telephones which is also becoming a valuable tool again when the communications infrastructure is down. It would be nice If Asterisk could be used but in this case but it's useless. People are displaced and most of the communications infrastructure for the city is unusable. I don't mean all of the telco's systems. It's the flood that wiped out most home and business systems. For us, The best thing that a provider can do is to have redundant servers in different cities. This should remind us all how fragile our lives are. Chris Travers wrote: Mark Phillips wrote: Hold on here folks, I'm guessing that the original poster of this thread isn't a member of his local RAyNet team. Whilst I don't profess to be an expert at this I have been doing emergency radio for quite some time and have seen service at the Lockerbie bombing, Docklands bomb, Ground Zero (I'm sure I'm a terrorist target y'know - they seem to follow me everywhere) and soon I'll be in Louisiana. In all of these events the KISS principle must and does prevail. We need a system that is a simple and energy efficient as possible. Building a network of * servers and Wi-Fi links is all very well but how are you going to power them? These are excellent points. I have a few interesting suggestions here.... The first is that the only obstacle to any sort of longer-range point to point line is merely power. This is true whether you are talking HAM or fiberoptics. Note that if you have the power, it would take disruption of the physical line to disrupt a fiber line. Note that DirectNIC in New Orleans remained operational without *any* downtime or loss of connectivity with the rest of the world. The suggestion that I have is for various areas to have dedicated civil emergency com units with strategic reserves of fuel (3-4 weeks worth), battery backups, etc. These units would have links (fiber, microwave, and/or satellite, better to pick 2 of 3) to areas outside expected disaster zones. Asterisk could then run across these links. (Sattelite links would best be POTS-type). The point is to a disaster-tolerant communications infrastructure which could then be used to to provide additional communications services to the relief workers. With various point to point wireless capabilities, it might be possible to use them to provide cell service to relief workers etc through the installation of GSM microcells (which could be brought in after the fact). See where I am going? Generators require fuel which is always in short supply and batteries die out quickly. Adding Ham Radio to the picture doesn't really add much when you are trying to do something like a * network. The radio gear just isn't designed to integrate with the * server. Ham radio is being used down in the Katrina affected area with great results for both emergency and heath/welfare related traffic. They are using both "phone" (that's when one talks in to the radio) and data modes and can be heard all over the 75 and 40 meter bands here in the US. Power for most of these stations comes from batteries they loot (with Police approval) from abandoned cars or a combo of solar and batteries. Many stations are only hear on the air after dark so that they can put as much sunlight into their batteries as possible. Yes, electricity is available in some places either all day or across the peak hours (allowing the workmen to restore power to other areas). Yes, there are radio to phone interconnects but these really are a single phone to a single radio. Think of it as a cordless phone in that the radio user can be anywhere within reach of the base station. Such technologies, whilst legal here in the US, may not be legal elsewhere. When last at home (UK) I was not able to connect my radio to the phone system by law (this may have changed recently - not been home for 8 years). Many countries have such restrictions and as we saw during the Tsunami, rules don't get relaxed just because there's a panic on. Without question a phone system would be much better than a radio station. As such I'll be taking a portable * server I've built, all the IP hard phones I can find and 5 DirectTV style Internet systems. How do IP hardphones work with satellite internet? I always thought people had real trouble getting them to work at all..... Best Wishes, Chris Travers Metatron Tecnology Consulting ________________________________ _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ________________________________ _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.digium.com/pipermail/asterisk-users/attachments/20050911/a3ac3753/attachment.htm
Try contacting the repeater trustee for http://www.wa3key.com/blura.html. They have a picture of one on their site with it lit up. You will need to recrystal the radio to a proper TX/RX pair for 70cm. However, depending on your area, you should contact your local repeater coordnator so you don't step on anyone's toes (especially the case in So.Cal ;) Looks like you can order crystals from: http://www.icmfg.com/motorola.html. And there are plenty of links associated with this hardware. Google is your friend. As for interfacing it to *, you'll need a phone patch adapter. You could purchase one or build one but you'll need to get more information on how to do such. Once you have the repeater up and running, you also need to setup * to see the phone patch/radio interface as a radio. This may require a controller card. (see the voip-info.org wiki) And... if you're going to go that far, consider enrolling into the echoirlp project. It's a VoIP oriented repeater link system that uses the internet as it's conduit. By Part 97 rule, the system must be protected from unlicensed use so interfacing with asterisk would require password protection and you as the repeater owner would be liable for any misuse of the system. 73 de Don ________________________________ From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Steve Totaro Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2005 6:07 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM Just a shot in the dark here. I bought this unit http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5792377951&rd=1&sspag ename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&rd=1 a couple months ago hoping to connect it to an * system for experimentation. I am a HAM n00b. I can found no documentation on this unit anywhere. Does anyone know where to start? I joined a local HAM club but have not had any time to go and pick brains. I am afraid to really even plug it in until I know what I am doing and have a call sign and everything so the FCC does't kick in my door. I did plug it in for a minute and there were no lights or anything so I not even sure it works. Anyone have any links or ideas? Thanks, Steve ----- Original Message ----- From: Don Fanning <mailto:don@00100100.net> To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion <mailto:asterisk-users@lists.digium.com> Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2005 1:37 PM Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM Time and time again, emergency action drills take place in cities to target where their weaknesses are in "crisis" handling. Usually they involve planes crashing or explosions (mock of course). Obviously they were never prepared for this sort of disaster in their recovery plan. I've participated in a few ARES/RACES drills and have to say that much could be done to improve upon the "HAM" infrastructure. Most of the time, communications is coordinated through 1 repeater system. When this repeater goes down, of course people would switch comms to another but in a case like this, where all the repeater systems go down except for maybe one, there needs to be a better plan. In Amateur Satellite Service, these orbiting "Repeaters" employ a system called RUDAK where a chunk of spectrum is repeated. Obviously this isn't feasible in terrestrial repeaters but they do have the ability to turn off radios and switch bands at will depending on operating conditions. With software controlled radio and Asterisk, the repeater system could be made to be more resilient to disaster by linking to other repeater systems via radio where it could connect outward. If you figure the overhead of a repeater's transmitter and receiver plus the controller, replaceing the controller with an asterisk based unit (integration) would make more sense as it would give the repeater system much more capabilities in the same footprint and power. Additionally, these repeater systems are located on hilltops with other radio systems so they should have emergency power available (if you've ever been to a hilltop repeater site, you'll know what I mean). I think the biggest thing that hurts ham radio's ability to react to a crisis is the lack of equipment and operators. Most of the traffic we pass is "Health and Welfare" with "Logistics" being the second to it. What defeats this is that in a disaster where local/high band long haul capabilities are diminished, is simply the one repeater that is functional because everything is squeezed onto one VHF/UHF repeater. Where I could see thing being improved? Installation of 802.11b/g WLAN under Part 97. It would allow for more users into the system, there are less hardware and power components and allows the system to be dynamically configured. Asterisk could play a huge role then as it's made for IP based traffic and could re-route in a split second. -Don ________________________________ From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Michael D Schelin Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2005 10:20 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM The two best forms of communications in a real disaster and one always has been is #1 Ham radio. and #2 satellite telephone. Ham radio is global and has proven time and time again to be the most reliable when the infrastructer has been damaged. The U.S government is the biggest user of satellite telephones which is also becoming a valuable tool again when the communications infrastructure is down. It would be nice If Asterisk could be used but in this case but it's useless. People are displaced and most of the communications infrastructure for the city is unusable. I don't mean all of the telco's systems. It's the flood that wiped out most home and business systems. For us, The best thing that a provider can do is to have redundant servers in different cities. This should remind us all how fragile our lives are. Chris Travers wrote: Mark Phillips wrote: Hold on here folks, I'm guessing that the original poster of this thread isn't a member of his local RAyNet team. Whilst I don't profess to be an expert at this I have been doing emergency radio for quite some time and have seen service at the Lockerbie bombing, Docklands bomb, Ground Zero (I'm sure I'm a terrorist target y'know - they seem to follow me everywhere) and soon I'll be in Louisiana. In all of these events the KISS principle must and does prevail. We need a system that is a simple and energy efficient as possible. Building a network of * servers and Wi-Fi links is all very well but how are you going to power them? These are excellent points. I have a few interesting suggestions here.... The first is that the only obstacle to any sort of longer-range point to point line is merely power. This is true whether you are talking HAM or fiberoptics. Note that if you have the power, it would take disruption of the physical line to disrupt a fiber line. Note that DirectNIC in New Orleans remained operational without *any* downtime or loss of connectivity with the rest of the world. The suggestion that I have is for various areas to have dedicated civil emergency com units with strategic reserves of fuel (3-4 weeks worth), battery backups, etc. These units would have links (fiber, microwave, and/or satellite, better to pick 2 of 3) to areas outside expected disaster zones. Asterisk could then run across these links. (Sattelite links would best be POTS-type). The point is to a disaster-tolerant communications infrastructure which could then be used to to provide additional communications services to the relief workers. With various point to point wireless capabilities, it might be possible to use them to provide cell service to relief workers etc through the installation of GSM microcells (which could be brought in after the fact). See where I am going? Generators require fuel which is always in short supply and batteries die out quickly. Adding Ham Radio to the picture doesn't really add much when you are trying to do something like a * network. The radio gear just isn't designed to integrate with the * server. Ham radio is being used down in the Katrina affected area with great results for both emergency and heath/welfare related traffic. They are using both "phone" (that's when one talks in to the radio) and data modes and can be heard all over the 75 and 40 meter bands here in the US. Power for most of these stations comes from batteries they loot (with Police approval) from abandoned cars or a combo of solar and batteries. Many stations are only hear on the air after dark so that they can put as much sunlight into their batteries as possible. Yes, electricity is available in some places either all day or across the peak hours (allowing the workmen to restore power to other areas). Yes, there are radio to phone interconnects but these really are a single phone to a single radio. Think of it as a cordless phone in that the radio user can be anywhere within reach of the base station. Such technologies, whilst legal here in the US, may not be legal elsewhere. When last at home (UK) I was not able to connect my radio to the phone system by law (this may have changed recently - not been home for 8 years). Many countries have such restrictions and as we saw during the Tsunami, rules don't get relaxed just because there's a panic on. Without question a phone system would be much better than a radio station. As such I'll be taking a portable * server I've built, all the IP hard phones I can find and 5 DirectTV style Internet systems. How do IP hardphones work with satellite internet? I always thought people had real trouble getting them to work at all..... Best Wishes, Chris Travers Metatron Tecnology Consulting ________________________________ _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ________________________________ _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.digium.com/pipermail/asterisk-users/attachments/20050911/3cae4f9c/attachment.htm
"Priority" traffic by ARRL standards would fall into both of these categories. What they are saying is that if someone is in a area where a ham is operating and needs to get someone hauled out via emergency services, priority traffic would take precedence over normal traffic. Not quite a "Mayday" situation but close to. Hams have come through for the most part but since we're way off topic, it boils down to poor planning on the emergency coordinator for a given town/county/city/state. Let's face it. When FEMA rolls in, there's no question about their communications. If they can run it through commercial terrestrial providers, fine. Otherwise, they have satellites phones that take less than a few minutes to set up (if that). Sure it's expensive to joe smith. But we're talking about the government here where justification always outweighs cost. That being said. Asterisk has tremendous value to the HAM community. People have always been happy to get a phone call from a serviceman at sea (using MARS) or using autopatches to order pizza's. I don't think that part is argued. The question is how it could be helpful? Asterisk Conferences - Add the ability for people who are HAMS to log into a protected chat room and communicate to both equipped and non equipped hams (using cell phones). Emergency services could teleconference a Public Radio Service repeater and monitor the conference to coordinate responses with lower overhead (again using COTS equipment). Asterisk Autopatching - This would allow people to setup "Health and Welfare" phone booths for people to call their loves ones and coordinate their return to a normal life. One feature that I see really lacking in Asterisk however is the ability to outdial from a teleconference to "three-way" them into a conference as well as moderator functions. Of course these features are in Alliance teleconferences but would be nice to add in as well. Cepstral Integration - Imagine if your car was stolen and it was equipped with APRS. You could write a script that would read lon/lat, do the map lookup and feed back location information every 10 seconds to assist in recovery. All it would take is 3-waying into the asterisk, logging in and having * read back the information to emergency response. The applications are endless with a system like this. -Don -----Original Message----- From: asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-bounces@lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of C. Hatton Humphrey Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2005 6:23 PM To: Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM> I think the biggest thing that hurts ham radio's ability to react to a> crisis is the lack of equipment and operators. Most of the traffic we> pass is "Health and Welfare" with "Logistics" being the second to it.You might be interested to take a listen to the latest ARRL News - they give a count of Priority traffic messages passed for Katrina... http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/audio/ The site is ARRL and it's their "ARRL Letter" feed to be presented on repeaters. The ARES response to Katrina articles have the info I'm referring to. Sorry for the OT addition to the thread but I find it worth mentioning. Also, for my two cents I'll toss in that the first thing I thought of when someone mentioned using Asterisk with Ham was to get a Laptop with a WiFi connection, Asterisk and a radio interface on scene to provide comm links. 73 de NY5I Hatton Humphrey _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation sponsored by Easynews.com -- Asterisk-Users mailing list Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users