Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Blackout is first test for emergency wireless telecom

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 27 Aug 2003 10:54:52 -0400

Blackout is first test for emergency wireless telecom

08/25/03
By William Jackson,
GCN Staff

The National Communications System’s priority telecommunications services got a
workout this month during the electrical grid
collapse that caused blackouts across much of the Northeast and Canada.

John Graves, program director of the Government Emergency Telecommunications
Service and Wireless Priority Service, said
GETS subscribers placed more than 1,800 calls. Fifty-five WPS calls were made in
the New York City area.

Although most of the nation’s telecom infrastructure remained in operation, call
volume sometimes overwhelmed the resources
to or from the affected areas. GETS gives priority landline service in
emergencies. WPS, a sister program, provides a similar
service on the cellular networks of T-Mobile USA Inc. of Bellevue, Wash.

“WPS was used across multiple switching centers in New York and Washington,”
Graves said. “Wherever T-Mobile had
power to its base stations, we had WPS capability.” The priority service was
available in blacked-out New York City, upstate
New York, Cleveland and Detroit.

Graves said his office is still collecting data about the completion rate of
priority calls.

NCS, formerly operated by the Defense Department, now is part of the Homeland
Security Department’s Information Analysis
and Infrastructure Protection Directorate. NCS gives priority during emergencies
to federal, state and local governments as well
as medical, law enforcement and critical industry personnel.

Numbers game

GETS users must have a calling card with an access number and personal
identification number for use in the United States and
its territories, Canada and most of the Caribbean area. Federal calls cost 15
cents per minute above a certain threshold.

After Sept. 11, 2001, 1,500 GETS cardholders made more than 18,000 calls with a 95
percent completion rate. The following
year saw a 40 percent increase in cards issued. As of last month, there were
nearly 79,000 active GETS cards.

WPS currently is limited to about 2,900 subscribers of T-Mobile’s Global System
for Mobile Communications network under
a General Services Administration schedule contract. NCS pays the infrastructure
costs; users pay a $10 one-time activation
fee, $4.50 for monthly service and 75 cents per minute.

Under consideration for WPS are other GSM carriers including AT&T Wireless,
Cingular Wireless and Nextel
Communications Inc. WPS also eventually could embrace Code Division Multiple
Access services offered by Verizon Wireless
and Sprint PCS.

“That is still a ways off,” NCS spokesman Stephen Barrett said. “Everything
depends on the funding.”

http://www.gcn.com/22_24/news/23259-1.html

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