>>>>>>Do they have shelters for 250,000?
>>>>>
>>>>>As usual we get a title for a story and no substance. Will there be followup to let us know what happened to the 250,000 people? I think not.
>>>>>
>>>>>I have friends and family in the NE San Diego area, and Valencia, who had to evacuate. They are telling people to not use cell phones in the area where the fires are.
>>>>>
>>>>>Too little rain = fire
>>>>>
>>>>>Too much rain = bigger fires (more growth to burn)
>>>>>
>>>>>You cannot win.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Why no cell phones?
>>>
>>>Our news said because the systems were overloaded and that they were using cell phones to communicate with the out-of-state fire fighters to coordinate where they should be.
>>
>>
>>What do you know, I guessed right for once. I didn't say anything because I thought, nah, our disaster response infrastructure must have a more private communications network than cell phones. That they apparently don't is kind of scary when you think about it.
>
>There's not much in the way of a "common" communications. You'd think with all the issues they had with that on 9/11 that it wouldn't be a problem anymore. It obviously is still not resolved. I think each community type emergency service is free to choose their own system, based on what they can afford, not on how well it ties into other systems.


This is one case where direction (not mandating, direction) needs to come from the national level. Maybe the federal government, maybe some scientific or industry body. If emergency agencies can't communicate well in the case of local disasters like 9/11, Katrina, and the current wildfires, what would happen if there was a truly epic disaster like nerve gas outbreak?