[Hannah]

I apologize if this have been brought up already.

But where is the technology? From the looks of things, and judging by that Hybrid Kia that everyone has been taking turns driving, it is at least the year 2011. I saw a computer on Jenners desk, Amy mentioned texting, and Randall ears were plugged with an iPod. But no one has taken advantage of such mass communication.  The radio has been repeating the same emergency message, but what about getting to a computer, I'm sure some blogger had listed possible safe zones. You can't tell me that if a ZA would happen right now that everyone wouldnt be on the nearest smartphone. Zombies would have cellphones falling out their pockets. I could be wrong, but after a power grid fail, wouldn't we still have a backup system that keep the electricity and Internet running for a while. Unless a super smart zombie disabled everything, I don't see why everyone is ignoring such a major resource for emergencies in our day and age. Lori pulled out a map for gods sake, google map your location instead, get everyone a cellphone and maybe that takeover on the farm wouldn't have been so bad. Am I the only one missing something here? Someone please explain what will happen to the Internet in a real ZA because I'm sure "zombie vid of the week" will be a major hit on YouTube, people would tweet safe zones, and smartphones will never be put down. I just find it funny that a cellphone has not even been shown on the show. WTF!

[Erasure]

There's no way the internet would still be up. Same for the mobile phone networks. While post-apocalyptic novels often claim that automated power stations would keep the power running for a while, in reality all power (and hence the internet and mobile phone networks) would be down within days if not hours of a mass apocalypse removing their workers.

[Kikora]

Really, Hannah? :S


Satellites have to be maintained, as to radio towers, wifi connections, cable lines, and everything that comes together to make the internet possible. It's not that this is all in place and will be maintained indefinitely, but that there are teams of experts who keep everything running. Signals from phones go to the cellphone towers, which relay them across a network to where they need to go. Computers work by wiring to travel to an internet provider, who connects them online. So on, and so forth.

Now, even if cell phones and computers linked directly up to the satellite, it really wouldn't matter because there's no power. There is no way to charge a cellphone, so there is no point in wasting the space to take one.

[firestopr]

there is no real back up to our power system take the new york black out as an example  . the cell towers and other vitals places do have generators but when there fuel runs out it is lights out

[Erasure]

It would be possible to charge a cellphone, as there are portable solar chargers that you can buy. But useless to have one, because there would be no network. However, solar chargers could charge batteries. E.g. see here: http://store.sundanc...solbatchar.html

These could be used to run walkie talkies for short range communications, and amateur CB and long wave radios. It would be possible for small pockets of survivors around the world to communicate if they gathered some kit.

In the longer run, it should be possible to restore local power using consumer electric windmills, small scale jerrybuilt hydroelectric power stations, and larger scale solar power. But worldwide or nationwide internet/cellphone? Not a chance.

Edit: Here we go: up to 190watts (on a clear sunny day of course) of 110v AC power: http://store.sundanc...com/misoqu.html

Another Edit: 300W wind power turbine: http://www.leturbine...00-wind-turbine

Of course, you need a permanent secure location and to find where you can scrounge things like this from before you can put the local power back on again.

Edited by Erasure, 22 March 2012 - 06:41 AM.

[Hannah]

Guess I watched "diary of the dead" and went bunkers after they showed people uploading video in their ZA. I think that was the one. But interesting articles. Appreciate the answers

[Erasure]

Interesting discussion here: http://www.hamradiof...pse-ham-network

[Blackwood Lurker]

I've wondered why everyone in the group doesn't have a two way radio of some kind that they carry at all times.  They can be found in just about every dept. store, and mine at least have both a built in rechargeable battery and also take AA's.  That way if anyone ever went missing (like Andrea) they could contact the group.  You wouldn't have to leave them on at all times.  Just leave one on at your base camp so that if someone needs to contact the group they can just turn theirs on and broadcast.  Most of them reach several miles, so they could be used in many situations.  And, as a previous poster noted, you can pick up solar recharges in most sporting goods stores.  Not to mention, batteries ought to be pretty easy to find when out scavenging.

[SkunkWorks]

Hannah, on 22 March 2012 - 06:18 AM, said:

I apologize if this have been brought up already.

I could be wrong, but after a power grid fail, wouldn't we still have a backup system that keep the electricity and Internet running for a while.

This is a Dept. of Homeland Security issue I've heard Congress complain about over the past years. The government did take notice of the benefits of cell phones after 9/11 but got a rude awakening when New Orleans fell apart after Hurricane Katrina.  As far as I can tell the government has made provisions to keep federal and military grids up during an emergency, but not for us peasants.  The wind turbines built over the past few years might be the closest backup we have.

[backwoodsroamer]

Having been there, I can testify that in the time span of one hour we lost all power and every form of communication when Hurricane Katrina hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The only communication was a few battery powered walkie tallkies I had. Their range was at best a few miles. Emergency services were no better off than the average citizen. Even the local National Guard was hit pretty hard. It took months for services to be restored in some areas. Most people don't realize how vulnerable these networks are. Add some zombies and you can see what would happen.

[Mr.Misery]

Hannah, on 22 March 2012 - 06:59 AM, said:

Guess I watched "diary of the dead" and went bunkers after they showed people uploading video in their ZA. I think that was the one. But interesting articles. Appreciate the answers

Diary was happening just as the ZA was going down. TWD is after the shit went down. IMO

[Aelle]

Kikora, on 22 March 2012 - 06:29 AM, said:

Now, even if cell phones and computers linked directly up to the satellite, it really wouldn't matter because there's no power. There is no way to charge a cellphone, so there is no point in wasting the space to take one.

Um...car chargers? =P

Satellites would still be able to broadcast a signal and passive devices, such as a GPS, would be able to pick them up. If you're really lucky and your cell phone service carrier has an off grid tower in the vicinity, your cell phone would actually still work for a while (since these are powered by fuel cell backup systems or generators). Don't count internet out though...not every tech geek is going to be nommed on and you can bet they can whip up a personal wifi network in a jiffy. Problem is, ad-hoc networks have very short range and unless someone's still out there maintaining servers, all the websites will be down. However, it would be a good way to find out whether or not there's anything left in the world...if all the .gov sites are down, you're doomed.

Edit: On the GPS thing...I don't know very much about how satellite sends and receives data, but it would be interesting if someone had access to upload data to a satellite much in the same way that they do now when there's a road change. Places on the map could be marked as safe zones.

Edited by Aelle, 22 March 2012 - 02:16 PM.

[zombiehunter]

Don't get me started on the corporate privitation of the electricity grid.

Different companies all own thier piece. One company owns the hydro plant, another company own the nuke plant, and then another company owns the transmission grid. If one of these companies goes down then the whole grid falls apart.

You may get some engineers and operators holed up at one plant control room but unless they could communicate with the transmission control room it would be next to impossible to keep the grid up.

Best bet would be at a hydro plant and you could generate power for the plant itself (lights, a kitchen etc) but eventually unless you had someone upstream operating the control dams your headpond would dry out and no more power.

[Serenity@sea]

backwoodsroamer, on 22 March 2012 - 01:52 PM, said:

Having been there, I can testify that in the time span of one hour we lost all power and every form of communication when Hurricane Katrina hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The only communication was a few battery powered walkie tallkies I had. Their range was at best a few miles. Emergency services were no better off than the average citizen. Even the local National Guard was hit pretty hard. It took months for services to be restored in some areas. Most people don't realize how vulnerable these networks are. Add some zombies and you can see what would happen.

Katrina was the first thing I thought of when reading the original post. I'm not from the area but as I watched, horrified, from the comfort of my home, I volunteered with the Red Cross. Words cannot convey what I saw. My heart still goes out to you and all the people who suffered through Katrina.


My problem with the OP isn't with the communication failure but that they said what would happen in a real ZA. Now, I have enough cynicism in me to believe that humankind might wipe itself out somehow but to think that the dead would rise and roam the earth is beyond my comprehension,

[General Ian Zane]

lots of part time dual use gov people have ham stations, fuel stores and generators. those would stay up for years, unless zombies destroy the ionosphere. i imagine those are all still runnable if the people are alive or not. along the coast, everone one has medium range communications on boats with fuel. hundreds would just be sitting in dry dock waiting to be used in every single town with a dock.

of course, farms and prisons are much better survival ideas, NOT

Edited by General Ian Zane, 22 March 2012 - 02:24 PM.

[ImRickGrimesBitch]

if not for the hyundai, i would assume some sort of EMP has struck the US, if not the world....(the other vehicles are late models, most likely not having computers)
The CDC would have been secure against an EMP, but most everything else would have fried...the occasional loose item may have survived, but major electrical grids and hardware would be useless.
If the ZA is manmade, its totally acceptable to think that a string of events that included an EMP caused this mess.

[lastman2012]

People are so addicted to communications these days. I often wonder what would happen if all of that just stopped. I honestly think that a mass panic would ensue.  I don't think that people consider how such a strong reliance on technology like communication makes a society vulnerable. Not to mention all the conveniences that run on electricity.
You want something to eat-go to the fridge. You are bored-turn on the tv or log in to your favourite blog. How would you feel when you flick a switch and nothing happens?  

  Hell even the emergency broadcast system wouldn't be much help if your tv and radio don't work from lack of power.

[Kikora]

Aelle, on 22 March 2012 - 02:12 PM, said:

Um...car chargers? =P

Satellites would still be able to broadcast a signal and passive devices, such as a GPS, would be able to pick them up. If you're really lucky and your cell phone service carrier has an off grid tower in the vicinity, your cell phone would actually still work for a while (since these are powered by fuel cell backup systems or generators). Don't count internet out though...not every tech geek is going to be nommed on and you can bet they can whip up a personal wifi network in a jiffy. Problem is, ad-hoc networks have very short range and unless someone's still out there maintaining servers, all the websites will be down. However, it would be a good way to find out whether or not there's anything left in the world...if all the .gov sites are down, you're doomed.

Edit: On the GPS thing...I don't know very much about how satellite sends and receives data, but it would be interesting if someone had access to upload data to a satellite much in the same way that they do now when there's a road change. Places on the map could be marked as safe zones.

I wouldn't waste my car battery to charge a useless phone, should I have been in that situation. XD

I've actually spoken to a satellite engineer about a situation similar to this one, for some writing I want to do, and he assured me that it does not work that way. If you have a way to relay a message to a satellite, you'd have to have something capable of reaching it, and it would have to be within a certain range in order to be reached at all. You cannot contact a satellite that is on the other side of the planet without the grid system that would have fallen with all the other utilities. In the end you'd have only a few minute window of opportunity while the satellite might be in the right spot to use, before it's gone again. Think about how many deadzones there are in America alone, just because it's not profitable to put towers that far out into the countryside... We need those in order to reach the internet, it's not like every device syncs directly and automatically.


There is a second problem that, realistically, these people would have to worry, on that note as well... Falling space junk. XP Ridiculous way to put it, but satellites have people correcting their orbit white a bit. It's not that they drift aimlessly in space, since they have small engines that are used to help keep them on course. Without anyone to pilot, eventually their orbit would deteriorate, and they would fall back to Earth.

[Aelle]

Kikora, on 22 March 2012 - 05:38 PM, said:

I wouldn't waste my car battery to charge a useless phone, should I have been in that situation. XD

Car batteries last a loooong time. I think we're all safe to charge our phones/listen to the radio/use the cigarette lighter. Even if the battery died, it would be one of those resources that would be relatively easy to scavenge since most people in a zombie apocalypse don't panic and think "OH MY GOD, we have to get to the auto parts store!" XD I'd still want my cell phone and my laptop with me (if possible) in a ZA, if for no other reason than to cure boredom while hunkering down. No need for internet if all I'm going to do is play Minecraft =P

I won't reply to the points you made on satellites because, as I said, I really don't know. I do still wonder about a GPS though; there's no real "service" that it connects to and it's capable of picking up satellite signals.

Edited by Aelle, 22 March 2012 - 08:10 PM.

[Seraiah]

I would think that the majority of technology would be out the door real quick as everything crashed and burned. I doubt when you are hoofing it away from a walker, you're gonna not be so concerned with your laptop, But, meh, that is just me.

[Milkman]

Aelle, on 22 March 2012 - 08:09 PM, said:

Car batteries last a loooong time. I think we're all safe to charge our phones/listen to the radio/use the cigarette lighter. Even if the battery died, it would be one of those resources that would be relatively easy to scavenge since most people in a zombie apocalypse don't panic and think "OH MY GOD, we have to get to the auto parts store!" XD I'd still want my cell phone and my laptop with me (if possible) in a ZA, if for no other reason than to cure boredom while hunkering down. No need for internet if all I'm going to do is play Minecraft =P

I won't reply to the points you made on satellites because, as I said, I really don't know. I do still wonder about a GPS though; there's no real "service" that it connects to and it's capable of picking up satellite signals.

To go once step further than just curing boredom I actually have books on my smart phone for roadside survival, winter survival and general survival.  I'm a zombie nut so 10% of the reason I have these is for the "impending ZA " and 90% because people get stranded in cars up where I'm from all the time.  I don't need any type of connection to read this info.  Its directly on my phone.  I just need a charged phone.  Obviously this isn't 100% fool proof but it is an added tool to my survival supplies (road not zombie) that doesn't add a lot of bulk.  I couldn't imagine always having those books and atlases in my truck at all times.

[backwoodsroamer]

Well the U. S. government says they've improved communication net works since 9/11 and Katrina. I worked mainly in the defense industry in various capacities most of my life. Mainly on government contracts. Would I bet my life on something the government told me? As T-Dog says, "Oh he## no." Anyone noticed the fantastic job the Transit Security Authority is doing in airports around the U. S.

In any kind of disaster, expect to lose everything.  Somebody mentioned nukes. They put a whole different spin on the ball, if they're ever used. When I left the industry ten years ago, they were still trying to find a practical way to harden electronics against an Electro Magnetic Pulse.

This maybe doesn't relate to the Z-poc or does.  Every major military power uses satellites for communications, navigation, intelligence gathering, and a host of other chores.  The monster in the closet that keeps military planners up at night is this. If a missile with a nuclear warhead is launched straight up and detonated just outside the atmosphere, the EMP generated by the blast will fry every satellite not hidden by the curvature of the earth.

No major power would ever do this, because it would blind you as well as your enemy. The problem is certain countries that don't rely on satellites are trying to develop nuclear weapons. What would these unstable countries do in a Z-poc?

Somebody said something about taking a lap top. I'm not trying to ridicule them, to each his own. I would probably hang on to a cell phone "just in case," because it's so small. However, I move slow enough as it is without having a lap top stuffed in my pack.      

[Kikora]

Aelle, on 22 March 2012 - 08:09 PM, said:

Car batteries last a loooong time. I think we're all safe to charge our phones/listen to the radio/use the cigarette lighter. Even if the battery died, it would be one of those resources that would be relatively easy to scavenge since most people in a zombie apocalypse don't panic and think "OH MY GOD, we have to get to the auto parts store!" XD I'd still want my cell phone and my laptop with me (if possible) in a ZA, if for no other reason than to cure boredom while hunkering down. No need for internet if all I'm going to do is play Minecraft =P

I won't reply to the points you made on satellites because, as I said, I really don't know. I do still wonder about a GPS though; there's no real "service" that it connects to and it's capable of picking up satellite signals.

There is no car radio, that HAS to be broadcasted, and I don't know who'd be dumb enough to go for a cigarette run. Besides that, scavenging is always a risk, and the longer cars are left neglected and unused, the more chance that their parts wont be ready for use should you run the battery out. When you're looking at potentially spending years just fighting walkers, and decades more rebuilding society. No one is making car batteries anymore, and if they get old, underused, destroyed, or otherwise damaged... You're screwed. Besides that, the LAST thing you want while trying to escape a zombie hoard is the car to stall. Besides that, many phones and laptops break if you drop them five feet. =_= Do you really think they'd survive a walker invasion?

Yes GPS needs towers as well. =_= Any way you can think to reach the internet from any device needs a relay point. Without the towers active none of it would work. There are people worldwide working around the clock to keep the internet up and running, it is not self-maintaining.


If you get bored in the zombie apocalypse then pick up a book, find survivors to entertain yourself with, secure camp, or grab a bat and play zombie baseball. There would be no shortage of things to do, I assure you. XP

[UniformSierra]

Even if they were up, everybody and their mother would be on the phone. The satelites and other devices used to pass on the information would be overloaded. Whenever an emergency happens, telephone lines are tied up and internet would be slow as hell.

So a CB is your best bet during a bad situation.

Phones and internet can go right out the window.

[Eastex]

Governments would have shut down everything but their own nets to stop media hysteria from taking over before the final collapse? Just a thought, heck just look at how hyped up the media got over Y2K, imagine what it would do with the dead rising