Wednesday, August 24, 2011

TEN YEARS LATER



At 1:57, Tuesday afternoon, 23 August, a 5.9M earthquake rattled the East Coast of the United States.

At 1:59, millions of people learned, that despite billions of dollars spent since September 11, 2001, the mobile technical infrastructure of the United States remains woefully incapable of handling a massive natural or man-made disaster.

Mere moments after the quake, the majority of cell service ceased to exist on Verizon & AT&T. Outbound dialing resulted in "dead air." Text & SMS capability failed. Outgoing text messages had the dreaded RED X ENVELOPE, indicating the message went straight into the bit bucket.

On the positive side, landlines and internet service remained in place and operational, for the most part. All well and good. However, with the vast majority of the American population and US Government being mobile centric, the failure of the infrastructure is, in my opinion, disgraceful.

Companies will use the "Act of God" or "we never foresaw this happening" defense as an excuse for the failures. Sorry folks, that doesn't cut it, especially in light of post September 11. Everyone knows the most important times are those first few moments/hours after a disaster occurs. Frankly, that's when the infrastructure is needed most. Emergency Management, Fire & Rescue and millions of citizens, worried about families and friends, inundate the systems. While companies can not be expected to have the capability to absorb every call and/or SMS, the Virginia earthquake has clearly revealed just how ill prepared US disaster preparedness remains.

Will we ever learn? Hint: That's a rhetorical question.