What you see on the news is only the tip of the iceberg of what really happened as a result of the devastating April 16 earthquake in Ecuador, Michigan physician Rick Dorsch, NE8Z/HC1MD, told ARRL (Amateur Radio association).
Since the 7.8 magnitude quake hit while most people were at home finishing dinner, thousands of people remain buried in the rubble of collapsed buildings, although some have been found alive. Dorsch and his wife Maria, HC1MM, also a physician, have been helping to handle health-and-welfare traffic via EchoLink, which is connected to the Ecuadorean interlaced national 2 meter repeater network.
EchoLink is actually a fantastic Amateur Radio service, Dorsch told ARRL. It has become extremely useful for the hams there to reach out to the outside world via 2 meters.
http://www.arrl.org/news/echolink-voip-service-proving-valuable-in-handling-ecuador-earthquake-traffic
EchoLink® software allows licensed Amateur Radio stations to communicate with one another over the Internet, using streaming-audio technology.
The program allows worldwide connections to be made between stations, or from computer to station, greatly enhancing Amateur Radio's communications capabilities. There are more than 200,000 validated users worldwide in 151 of the world's 193 nations with about 5,200 online at any given time.
http://www.echolink.org/
http://www.echolink.org/support.htm
Indeed, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) doesn't automatically mean telephone, it can also mean radio. The software is parallel.
The EchoLink system has been hopeful in other natural disasters such as the deadly Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004.
Thanks to all the amateur radio operators and volunteers!
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And for mazilo. ;)
Raspberry Pi for Amateur Radio VOIP (Echolink)
http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2014/february/raspberry_pi_for_amateur_radio_voip.htm
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