Cell Service during Hurricane

[Johnny5]

I am in Virginia Beach, VA and I'm presently getting ready for hurricane Isabell, my question is how do cellular networks perform during major weather events like this?

[jayc]

Look what happened during the blackout... I'd imagine a hurricane would be much worse.

[GoodmanR]

A hurricane would potentially be much much worse. In additon to blanket power outages a hurricane could cause, towers could also simply be damaged or destroyed, taking much much more time to get back online. Also, with numerous lines down instead of one huge issue, it will take much longer to restore power. However, if lines do go down, your best bet is with your cell, not your home phone.

[MR2driver]

Heavy rain and wind will effect reception. Any type of power outage will aslo effect the cell site. Ad like stated above, cellsites maybe destroyed or damaged by winds or flooding. Have fun with your Hurricaine, we lucked out in FL this time!

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[A999]

i would recommend making sure you have text messaging. if capacity is full on cell sites text messages will still be very reliable as long as a cell site doesn't go down. over use of the network will be a problem not just the potential of loosing power to the sites. get text messaging if you don't have it to stay in touch cell2cell!

[bobolito]

In metro areas where there are not many towers, cells are placed on top of high buildings. Will those be less susceptible to damage? The base station equipment is normally placed on top of the building as well, so it won't get flooded.

[GoodmanR]

good point bobolito...

still though, many sites in wooded areas, especially in the suburbs and rural areas where there are no tall buildings for sites to be on, could be in for a bad time

[AL904a]

There is another, not so obvious, problem with cellphones as well as landline phones in times of crisis. When a hurricane is about to hit, too many people are making phone calls. There is far too much demand for connections, so, even if all the networks are working, the towers have electricity, etc. many people can't connect. The circuits are simply overloaded.

A few years ago, we had an evacuation due to a hurricane ordered. I was trying to call my wife, and couldn't get a call out using my office (landline) call. I had a dial tone, but when I dialed I kept getting a rapid busy signal, or nothing. When I tried to call using my cellphone, the same thing would happen. I kept dialing over and over, and sometimes would seem to get out on the wireless network, but not get into the landline network. I finally got thru, but it was a long time trying.

I think Nextel's direct connect, or any carrier's SMS is more likely (but certainly not guaranteed) to work.

[JJSeminole]

Yep I've heard Nextel's Direct Connect worked exceptionally well during 9/11. I wonder how Verizon's PTT service would be in the event of something bad happening.

[bobolito]

They say SMS works better during an overload time, but I found that to be false. At least for me. During the blackout, I had a good signal, but I could not make calls unless I insisted redialing until I was lucky to get a voice channel. A clear case of tower overload. In this case, SMS won't work either. I was trying SMS for hours and most messages failed to send. Those few that went through, took as much as 45 minutes to reach destination because the receiving phone's network was too busy to deliver messages. I don't think that a 30 to 45 minute lag is any effective means of communication. So unless the tower is NOT overloaded, and the congestion problem is only on the wireline side (Verizon), SMS is just as bad. Needless to say, most of the times when the wireline network is overloaded, most likely the towers will be overloaded too, so SMS won't work during most crisis where people overflow the networks.

[DannyLee312]

I guess the same will go for PTT over the 1xRTT protocol????