On Tue, 30 November 1999, Jared Mauch wrote:

I find this quite an interesting challenge, if you can't place a call, you can't get paged to know that your router in some remote site just died, nor can they call to tell you, nor can you call the utilities to determine why.

For those deemed important enough, there are alternative switches and communication lines in place to contact utilities and such. ISPs providing necessary services can qualify for preferential treatment. The two buzzwords you need are GETS and TSP. Additional information is available from the FCC http://www.fcc.gov/ and NCS http://www.ncs.gov/ The FCC or NCS will act as the "sponsor" for qualifying ISPs. Yep, its like the ARPANET all over again, you need a "sponsor." When I applied, it took about two weeks. Interestingly enough, the Internet has been used as a backup communications channel for several events already. But because of the unreliable reputation of the Internet (FUD), agency managers haven't wanted to publicize they were using the net.