Katrina hampers long-distance, cell services

Now that's what I call an interesting article, the comparison between the landline and cell networks made for quite a cool read. It's just surprising to hear that no towers were knocked. Obviously, they're built to withstand major winds but with such a strong hurricane passing through you'd expect to see some structural damage for them as well.

 

I agree, I would have expected to hear some towers fell or were damaged other then flooding or phone line problems, but I guess they design them to withstand over 200 MPH winds.
I just hope 1st people made it thru the storm and there is no loss of life.
It will be interesting to see how fast they can restore power & phone service down there, especially with the flooding.

 

Here's Cingular's official press release:

http://www.cingularhurricaneupdates.com/

 

This TV station lost its tower in Biloxi, Mississippi.

 

The situation in New Orleans and Jefferson Parish seems to be deteriorating as the water continues to rise. Even with back up power (whether it is diesel generator, fuel cell, or batteries) the cellular systems will only go for a few days without restoration of power.

Diesel generators can maintain power as long as they have diesel, however refueling them in a badly flooded area is not going to be easy. The first priority will most likely be the diesel generators running the pumps.

 

I believe that we will see that mobile sites will be erected ASAP. I understand that barges are in route for power generation in general

 

I wonder how much general power there will be until the water is pumped out of Jeferson Parish.

I certainly think that we will see generator barges supplying hospitals, other health care as well as public safety facilities. Cell phone towers would rank high on the list, but below these.

 

But what good do cell towers if trunk lines connecting them to switches are not working and if switches themselves are down.

 

They have something called "microwave links"

This way they can route calls to whichever MSC is working.

 

Here's a definition of the MSC:

MSC

A Mobile Switching Center (MSC) is the electronic field office of a cellular carrier, a computer-controlled switch for managing automated network operations. An MSC automatically coordinates and controls call setup and routing between mobile phones in a given service area. MSCs are connected to base stations by T1 landlines or microwave channels, and by landlines to the Public Service Telephone Network (PSTN).

MSCs maintain individual subscriber records, current status of subscribers, and information on call routing and billing in two subscriber databases called the Home Location Register (HLR) and the Visitor Location Register (VLR). The HLR contains subscriber profiles, while the VLR provides information relevant to roamers.

http://developers.sun.com/techtopics/mobility/midp/articles/sms/

 

But as far as I know, not every cellsite, epecially in urban areas, has microwave links.

 

How about isolated places like deserts or large mountainous areas in the Midwest? I would expect microwave links up there since it's hard to imagine that they would run miles and miles of cables/wires through such areas where a cell tower isn't needed every 1/2 mile.

 

That I agree with, but I just don't think that cellsites in the middle of downtown New Orleans all have microwave backhaul.

 

You'd be surprised as to how much MW is used in southeast Louisiana -- the terrain helps, and there's always been a lot of MW used for connections to offshore oil platforms and on land for pipeline and other infrastructure monitoring (SCADA) so it's something people in that area are familiar with.

-SC

 

Not only that, but I was referring to the COWs which are temporarily installed and can be setup quickly using MW to bypass the non-working wireline networks.

 

Yes and all of the wireless telco switches I have seen run on DC power, a big battery room that actually powers the equipment. Commercial power is used to keep the batteries charged, and when commercial power goes out the generators are switched on. So unless it's underwater many switches should be operational. Of course if the connection the the PSTN (landline telco companies) is down then you run into some problems, that you don't have as much control over.