davef@brspyr1.brs.com (Dave Fiske) (09/23/89)
Although my mother's residence is in the city of Charleston, they fled
to Asheville NC, so I don't have any real good stories (though, I'm
glad they did leave).
I had tried to call them early last evening, with limited success.
Using AT&T resulted in an intercept recording that mentioned the
hurricane. Using Sprint, I got either a reorder tone, a ring which was
answered with a recording that "All circuits are busy...", or a
completed call. My family had their answering machine on, however, so
I didn't actually make contact until they called upon arrival in
Asheville.
I'm sure the problem was just a deluge of other calls to relatives,
which tied up the circuits. Around 1 AM this morning, after the eye of
the hurricane had passed through, I dialed the Charleston number, and
got a ring, but no answering machine. Presumably the power was out.
As far as I could tell, the phones were operating.
During the night, Cable News Network spoke to people over normal phone
lines, as well as cellular. Around 2 AM, they spoke (by phone) to
a woman who was working at the Southern Bell office in downtown Charleston.
She mentioned that, with the exception of two barrier islands, all phone
service was still in operation. She mentioned that this was due to
79% of their lines being underground.
Overall, I think it was a very impressive showing by Southern Bell.
"ANGRY WOMEN BEAT UP SHOE SALESMAN Dave Fiske (davef@brspyr1.BRS.COM)
WHO POSED AS GYNECOLOGIST"
Home: David_A_Fiske@cup.portal.com
Headline from Weekly World News CIS: 75415,163 GEnie: davefmbw@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Martin B Weiss) (09/24/89)
My parents live on the SW corner of Puerto Rico. They had minimal damage due to Hugo, as they were over 100 miles from the eye. I haven't yet gotten through to them on MCI, although, using 10288, I have been successful several times with AT&T. Martin Weiss Telecommunications Program, University of Pittsburgh Internet: mbw@idis.lis.pitt.edu OR mbw@unix.cis.pitt.edu BITNET: mbw@pittvms