Earthquake jams phones, social networks
Co-workers Peggy Shanks, left, and Terri DeLibro sit on a bench outside of an office building as Shanks calls her granddaughter after an earthquake was felt in Baltimore. (Aug. 23, 2011) Credit: AP
Long Islanders got busy signals Tuesday after the earthquake, as land and cellular telephone systems were flooded with calls. Many turned to social networks and found them crowded.
Police in Nassau and Suffolk counties said calls to their 911 systems soared in the minutes after the quake, which shook the ground at 1:51 p.m. In Nassau, Det. Lt. Kevin Smith said more than 2,200 calls were received between 1:45 p.m. and 2:45 p.m. -- more than seven times the usual number for that hour. "The majority of them were inquiries," he said. He said supervisors at the call center could not recall a bigger surge.
Suffolk police said their 911 system received 482 calls between 1 and 2 p.m. Tuesday, compared with 160 calls during the same period Monday.
Verizon spokesman John Bonomo said the system was overwhelmed for 20 or 30 minutes after the tremor but there was no physical damage to its equipment.
"We saw a spike in both the landline and wireless side of the business," he said. "As a result of that, people may have gotten a fast busy signal on the land side or, on the wireless side, a call not going through."
It was the same up and down the East Coast. Verizon Wireless, AT&T and Sprint and T-Mobile told The Associated Press their networks were congested after the quake.
Cablevision Systems Corp. of Bethpage, which owns Newsday, said in a statement, "No service disruptions or system issues have been reported, and our voice, video and Internet services are functioning well."
Map locates the epicenter of an earthquake in Virginia. (Aug. 23, 2011) Credit: AP
Lee Bogner, a chief information officer in Garden City, tried calling and texting his wife by cellphone -- after he and his colleagues evacuated Marden Kane, a promotional marketing agency. Immediate cell service was "ineffective," he said.
Christine Cesarino, 28, production manager at Freeport-based Basso on Business, an information resource for small businesses, said she and colleagues weren't quite sure what had happened, so "after the rumbling stopped, we hopped on social media." Before heading outside, she said, she tried calling her husband from her landline. That was unsuccessful, as were early attempts from her cell. She did eventually get through, after she started receiving text messages from friends in Texas.
In the minutes following the earthquake, Derek Donnelly, a public advocacy and technology consultant, set up an open Facebook group called Long Island Earth Quake, where people came to share reactions and information. By about 5:30 p.m. almost 290 people had joined.
'Let somebody else have a chance' Hundreds of Long Island educators are double dipping, a term used to describe collecting both a salary and a pension. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn and Newsday investigative reporter Jim Baumbach report.
'Let somebody else have a chance' Hundreds of Long Island educators are double dipping, a term used to describe collecting both a salary and a pension. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn and Newsday investigative reporter Jim Baumbach report.
