[Asterisk-Users] civil emergency comms: Asterisk + HAM

Sun Sep 11 13:37:00 MST 2005

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 at lists.digium.com
[mailto:asterisk-users-bounces at 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 

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