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October 23, 2007

Wi-fi in shelters keeps Calif. fire evacuees connected

Network World does an email interview with retired tech editor (InfoWord, PCWeek, MacWeek, Demo) Jim Forbes, from a shelter "in Escondido, Calif., about three miles from the San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park right at the edge of the Witch Creek Fire, which I assume will be stopped before it gets to either Hawaii or the first set of breakers on the coast."

Here's the link -- 'Fire blogging' tech expert on how fellow evacuees and networks are holding up -- and his report on the tech capacities:

The shelter set up a dedicated computer room with an 802.11 a,b, and g network which worked like a charm. Lots of people brought notebooks when they left their home, so there was a whole lot of IM traffic in and out of the shelter. The local cell networks were subsumed by traffic early in the day so people were texting friends and loved ones a lot.

Local media did a great job of telling people that the most efficient way of telling others where they were or assuring those people that they "were safe" was by texting, which has a lower bandwidth demand than voice. With 250,000 people turned into refugees by the fires there was a lot of stress on voice networks. I only got a "network unable to place call" message twice yesterday on I-15 as I went zero miles an hour.

Is there technology the shelter should have but doesn't?

Local emergency services gets straight A's for its use of 802.11 mesh networks - a technology launched in 2000 at DemoMobile that's now become pervasive.

The presence of 802.11 networks at evacuation shelters is now assumed and is widely used by relief workers and refugees alike.

On his own site, ForbesOnTech, Jim Forbes is also fire-blogging.

He's praising the shelter -- "hey put on nice spaghetti feed and provided games and television for kids and adults. And no pet at the evacuation center went without water and at least a knish and a reaffirming stroke between their ears." -- and slamming AM radio:

With the one exception of the San Diego AM radio fox affiliate, the new has been incredibly superficial. There have been almost no details on what routes are open or how to get to the Fallbrook Gate of Camp Pendleton to drive across the base and get on I-5, which is open to Los Angeles. But there has been a lot of sniveling from one specific radio talk show host, Roger Hedgecock on the lack of air tanker support for the San Diego firestorm. Never mind that the winds make it unsafe for tankers to fly, or that the voters of San Diego turned down a bond measure that would have provided organic air tanker support in 2003. The bond was turned down because it would have increased taxes. Well D’oh!

The inability or unwillingness of AM radio to provide detailed information on the status of communities effected by the fires in San Diego is one of the most damning comments that can be made about talk radio today. There are more than 200,000 residents of this county that have been evacuated to centers tonight and all talk and news radio can do is provide superficial overviews of fire status and not one scintilla of granular detail.

Last night, he ended up moving:

The big out call came from the police department around 1 p.m. so I loaded up my useless cats and my road dog and off I went to an evacuation center at the north end of Escondido. I stayed there until about 6 tonight and decided to haul ass for Azusa, where I know my dog and useless cats will be safe for the night...

Well, I’ve got to tend to my grove and then set my alarm clock for midnight, to make sure that my mountaintop is still safe.

To my friends and family that read my sometimes odd ramblings; every one is tucked in and safe, here on my little mountaintop in rural northern San Diego County where I can move my water canons by the fiery light of the Witch Creek Fire. Cough cough, Jim Forbes on 10/22/2007.

There's been nothing from him today. Let's hope he's conserving his battery on the mountaintop.

Wednesday update: Today, he's back posting.

Related: SignOn San Diego is all over this, including a firemap

Doc Searls, newly a fellow at Harvard, tracks what's happening "back home," with lots of good links, not all of which are available at all times:

Fire news, cont’d
More fires
News 0.2, cont’d

Also: San Diego Fire Resources (Witch Fire & others, Oct 2007) at Jim 2.0's blog. One of them is a live Webcam, with large views from four directions: Lyons Peak Cameras

Posted by Sheila Lennon  at 4:09 PM | Permalink