Title: Engineers Race to Restore Communications after Haiti Quake
Author: Harry Goldstein
Source: IEEE Spectrum
Publisher: IEEE
Date (published): 19/01/2010
Date (accessed): 20/01/2010
Type of information: article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
With thousands of doctors, nurses, aid workers and troops descending on Port-au-Prince in the last week to join more than 800 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) already there, reporters on the ground have observed that the damage done to the telecommunications infrastructure is hampering coordination efforts. But in an ironic twist, it turns out that Haiti's Internet connectivity is robust precisely because its telecommunications infrastructure is so underdeveloped. Specifically, most Haitian ISPs connect to the Internet via satellite and are not dependent on the country's lone undersea fiber optic cable link, which was knocked out the during the quake. The challenge for engineers now is the proverbial last mile--getting local connections to satellites restored so NGOs can get online.

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