Satellite, and for that matter a shortwave radio, would be great for world news. That could be very comforting in time of local or regional disaster.

In the case of a local disaster, though, I'd most like to have local news. In combination with local (2m) ham radio and maybe a scanner, that's going to give me the best immediate picture of what's going on. For decent news here, that means TV.

Until I can find a decent portable TV, I'm going to look at either making a DC to DC converter for my 17" LCD TV and amplified antenna, or use an inverter to run from a 12v battery. In combination they draw less power than my notebook computer, and they start faster and are more reliable. Neither is as good as a handheld TV was in the analog days.

Wondering out loud - Either Kenwood or Icom used to make a ham HT with a digital display. I wonder if any had digital tv tuners?