[Scan-DC] Today's Washington Post

[Stephen Platt]

Seems by the time I recieved this digest the article in the Post onlist had
already been archived and not accessible without
leaving your life story with them. Thought I'd share this piece from the
weekly ARRL Letter:
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* Hams assist hospital after telephone outage: Amateur Radio Emergency
Service (ARES) and Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service (RACES)
volunteers in Maryland helped bridge a communication gap August 16 after
Prince George's Hospital Center in Cheverly--the county's
largest--experienced a near-total telephone outage at around midday. The
Prince George's County Office of Emergency Management called on ARES-RACES
volunteers, under the direction of Prince George's County Emergency
Coordinator and RACES Officer Jim Cross, WI3N, to supplement the
hospital's back-up telecommunications system. The radio amateurs had
support from The Green Mountain Repeater Association's 146.610 and 146.880
MHz repeaters. ARES-RACES volunteers deployed to the hospital as well as
to the county emergency operations center and to two other area
hospitals--Laurel Regional and Bowie Health Center--to provide
coordination and support. "Our people showed a level of dedication to be
proud of," Cross said. WRC-TV, the NBC affiliate in Washington, DC,
reported the ARES-RACES activation and said the outage may have been due
to a computer system malfunction. The hospital's telephone service was out
for about 10 hours.--Murray Green, K3BEQ; NBC4; Chauncy Bowers, N3XOR

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