[OT] Communicating without grid power

A cell phone.

Flags, Smoke signals, tin cans and string, bike, carrier pigeons .... telawoman probably the fastest

Why do you introduce the additional criteria "grid power". Scott only says power.

It is impossible to communicate without power. Even "by foot, horse, runner, shouting" all take power.

Scott needs to better define his question.

Scott's wife had a cell phone, might still have. Running struggle to buy minutes for it. Cell phones rely on towers, which might or might not have backup power.

Their residential phone number comes over the internet cable which goes dead with the power failure. They also use cordless phones, which go dead with the power failure.

The last couple power cuts, my residential phone worked fine. And the cell phone also worked.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

Reminds me of the old one about three ways to communicate at the speed of light.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

That's a big picture, attention to detail way to look at it.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

We don't know if without power means from a physics sense, in which case even a cell phone or battery operated radio is out, or if it just means when the electric utility service is out.

And then be able to communicate with whom, where are they located and for what purpose?

...pointless statement because there would be no power to the phone modem.

all my home telco/ISP/WIFI equipment is on a UPS.

hilltop signal fires, drums, semaphore flags on hilltops, light reflecting from mirrors on hilltops. tin cans and string. dry garden hose (for short distances), think of the tubes used to communicate between decks in old ships. pigeons

How big is your battery bank? We had a problem this summer where about

You fire up the amateur radio transceiver in your car -- or the one at home for which you have well-maintained standby batteries.

"When all else fails... There's Amateur Radio."

Amateur Radio was used when the cell-phone towers on top of the World Trade Center were put out of action. Amateur Radio was used in the search for the debris from the space shuttle that was scattered over remote areas of Texas with no cell-phone service.

Perce

oh, no. I don't know how long I could operate. I really should unjumble that rat's nest of wires and figure out what is really connected to the UPS. I know my printer/fax is, in case there was an incoming fax. But now that I am on voicemail, the fax is no longer automatic - time to power it from other than the UPS. I can't remember the last time I received a fax, either.

My theory is I could always power from the car in some fashion or another. Or drag out the generator, which I might to run my fridge if we were really out that long.

My better theory is - aw, just forget about it and get some sleep.

...happy for you! ( ????????)

Bear in mind, we had telegraph systems in the US 50 years before there was a power grid. The POTS phone system seems to work fairly well when the grid is down too. It is only the very late 20th century systems that are so reliant on grid power. As another poster pointed out, radio systems can be completely separate from all traditional infrastructure. With solar charged batteries, they can go on indefinitely with no central infrastructure at all. Combining radio with digital transmission could increase the effective bandwidth far beyond the limitations of voice communication. The only reason why we consider grid power to be absolutely essential to communication is because it was cheap and reliable when our current systems were developed. There are certainly alternatives.

Per snipped-for-privacy@aol.com:

I always thought that it would be useful to have a standard for power sources on cell phone towers, repeaters, and so-forth so that, in a disaster, a given tower/node can be powered using the omnipresent

Not enough power. The cell sites I have seen have a line voltage socket for a temporary generator, and a transfer switch. (as well as a bank of batteries always charged and at the ready).

I have to wonder how many generators will be available in an emergency to power such facilities not equipped with their own dedicated generator.

First idea would be to study history.

A tornado passed by here in May. Wired phone was out for several days. UPS didn't matter. No problems with water (city has a generator).

BTW, cell phones still worked (I had Verizon and Sprint phones, so I know those worked).