59Moots

Based on my neighbor who supports and maintains cell towers in remote locations throughout the Rocky Mountains, those systems are redundant in supply of back up power from batteries and generators. I experienced a 7.0 earthquake in Anchorage Alaska and never lost cell service as I was worried my house was going to collapse around me. I wonder to what degree of abuse, strain, adversity many of the unhardened amateur supported GMRS repeaters are likely to survive given "grid compromised due to domestic or international threat" compared to the comms systems that have been designed to meet a perticular threat level. I'm not convinced from what I read here that many GMRS stations/repeaters would be sufficiently grounded to survive even a lightning strike. In a true emergency, a satellite communication like is going to be the most reliable and dependable method to call for help when everyone else is outside attempting to use their emergency HTs that were never going to cover the needed distance without a repeater. GMRS is a tool, but a vital one - maybe not in remote locations where you're tied to an amateur repeater that maybe can't even take a lightning hit. Just an opinion from the peanut gallery.