Cutting-edge telecom help reconnect Asia's tsunami-displaced people<\/p>\n
Edward Harris, Associated Press, Blang Bintang, Aceh<\/p>\n
Before the killer tsunami leveled his house and swept away his
\ndaughter, Umar Bin Adam had never used a computer.<\/p>\n
Now, squatting in a makeshift refugee camp in a schoolyard on
\nan Indonesian island, he taps a number into a satellite phone,
\nmystified but grateful for the high-tech help in his hunt for his
\ndaughter.<\/p>\n
\"For me, it's really a big help. I can communicate with my
\nfamily,\" Bin Adam, 38, said after replacing the black handset
\nconnected to the nearby dish that beams his words into space.
\nThousands of foreign aid workers flooding into the Asian zones
\nhit hardest by the Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami are bringing
\nsophisticated phones, radios and computers -- altering the
\ncommunications landscape in some of the world's poorest, most-
\nremote lands.<\/p>\n
People in stricken regions say they hope the disaster-response
\ncrowd will leave behind the gear when they go -- and aid workers
\nsay at least the mobile-phone networks they're rebuilding to help
\nfoster the aid effort likely will remain.<\/p>\n
Humanitarian workers point to satellite phones and remote
\nInternet connections as among the latest tools helping them
\ncoordinate the world's biggest-ever aid-delivery effort.<\/p>\n
In northern Sumatra's Aceh Province, closest to the epicenter
\nof the earthquake and hardest hit by the tsunami, the disaster
\nruined many mobile-phone signal-repeater posts, leaving residents
\nand aid workers alike cursing poor coverage and dropped signals.<\/p>\n
Many foreign aid workers leapfrog the shaky mobile system via
\nsatellites. There are now two networks for handheld satellite
\nphones and laptop-sized systems with more bandwidth can be used
\nto access the Internet.<\/p>\n
Survivors in this region where 106,000 were killed in the
\ndisaster aren't so lucky.<\/p>\n
In the provincial capital Banda Aceh the tremors and waves
\nsmashed countless Internet cafes and many survivors lost their
\nmobile phones in their flight to safety. Terrestrial telephone
\nlines are down in many places.<\/p>\n
Sweden's Ericsson AB and other major telecommunications
\ncompanies are helping rebuild the mobile-phone network smashed by
\nthe waves in Asia, with Ericsson donating ten radio-base stations
\nfor Banda Aceh's network, along with hundreds of mobile phones
\nand staff.<\/p>\n
U.S.-based Motorola Inc. says it has donated the equivalent of
\nUS$3 million in cash and equipment across tsunami-stricken Asia.
\nDag Nielsen, head of Ericsson's disaster-response team, says
\nBanda Aceh's mobile network will be vastly improved, using
\ntechnology called GPRS which has greater data-transmission
\npossibilities than the former network. Aid workers will be the
\nfirst to benefit, but in the long term it will help the Acehnese.<\/p>\n
Nielsen, who helped set up a network in Afghanistan's war-
\nruined capital, Kabul, said that unlike earlier humanitarian
\nmissions there are no plans to dismantle Banda Aceh's boosted
\nmobile-phone network when the foreigners leave.<\/p>\n
Across the Indian Ocean, in Sri Lanka, officials maintained
\nlinks between rebel and government forces, helping prevent
\nfighting from breaking out in the tsunami chaos in the country
\nwhere nearly 31,000 died.<\/p>\n
\"We kept up the contacts with both the sides using mobile and
\nsatellite phones,\" said Helen Olafsdottir, spokeswoman for the
\nNorwegian-headed Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission, which oversees a
\n2002 cease-fire.<\/p>\n
A France-based aid group called \"Telecoms sans Frontieres\" --
\nor \"Telecoms without Borders\" -- is helping people like Bin Adam
\ncontact loved-ones by setting up satellite phones in refugee
\ncamps.<\/p>\n
While younger, urban Acehnese are accustomed to surfing the
\nInternet and chatting on mobile phones, older refugees are
\nthrilled and bewildered at finding their words sent through
\nspace.<\/p>\n
The European Union-funded program is aimed at helping
\nreconnect shattered communities, while offering a chance for
\npanicked survivors to hash out their emotions.<\/p>\n
\"In this kind of disaster, there's often post-traumatic stress
\ndisorder, so it's important to talk, to release your emotions
\nwith your support group, which is friends and family,\" says John
\nAbo, who helps run the telephones set up under a tent in the
\nschoolyard south of Banda Aceh where about 1,000 survivors are
\nsheltering.<\/p>\n
Ragged children inspect the black, shoebox-sized telephones,
\nwhich are connected by a line to small dishes set up several
\nyards (meters) away, aimed at the heavens.<\/p>\n
Bin Adam looks glum as he hangs up after his call, which
\nyielded no news of his daughter Juliana, whom he last saw in
\ntheir home on the morning of Dec. 26.<\/p>\n
There's one thing all the fancy technology can't do to help
\nBin Adam.<\/p>\n
The rising waters that snatched away his daughter and home
\nalso swept away everything inside the house, including the paper
\non which he had jotted all telephone numbers except the one he
\nhad memorized and already dialed.<\/p>",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
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