RoamAD does mobile VOIP at 80 miles per hour
Esme Vos reports on Muniwireless about RoamAD’s latest success
-/23 Feb, 2005 - The Wi-Fi Technology Forum/-Just as I was reading Verizon's latest proclamation that "with Wi-Fi, you are limited to one spot" (see Glenn's post on Verizon's latest wireless FUD in Texas), in comes a Skype call from Martyn Levy of RoamAD who tells me that the world's first highway Wi-Fi mobile voice network has been successfully tested on a US interstate highway – the Canamex Interstate Highway (I-19) from Rio Rico to a point south of Green Valley, Arizona.
Wi-VOD deployed it using a Department of Homeland Security grant; the network is managed by the Arizona Telecommunications and Information Council. Get this: Wi-VOD claims it was able to make multi-party VoIP conference calls at speeds in excess of 130 kilometres per hour (80mph) sustained over the entire network.
Before you all start yakking on your Wi-Fi PDAs breaking Arizona speeding laws, please note that the network is for public safety personnel (police, fire, ambulance and border partrol) first, with various community agencies, schools, business and local residents being added as the deployment expands beyond its targeted coverage areas. [Attention anti-muni broadband legislators: check out this deployment.]
Commenting on the test, Chief Mike Foster, Rio Rico Fire Department said: “We needed to increase our ability to communicate in the field. Having mobile voice and high-speed Internet access in our mobile units on the highways delivers what we are looking for. The speed at which the mobile VoIP worked was very impressive. It will greatly increase our in-field communications and effectiveness."
Wi-VOD demonstrated the first phase of the network, 4.9 miles (8 km), earlier this month. The network contained four RoamAD network nodes located on average 1.2 miles (less than 2 km) apart and interconnected wirelessly. The network will be expanded to cover 32 continuous miles (54 km) of highway and is scheduled for completion before May of this year. According to Verizon, this is impossible.
Read more about Verizon's wireless FUD on Glenn's site. It's pretty hilarious after the Rio Rico public safety officers' experience with mobile Wi-Fi.
More information:
Esme Vos reports on
Muniwireless about
RoamAD’s latest success:
| Forums:
