Originally Posted By: Mark_R
Also, a text only message with the important details and a link to a website for more information seems to be the best solution. In a disaster, mobile bandwidth tends to be overloaded by everybody scrambling for information.


While this isn't my area of professional expertise, I understand that the carrier sends these broadcast messages once, addressed and routed in a way to reach every device connected to their network via specific cell sites. In other words, the bandwidth that would be used by a multimedia broadcast would be very small.

Even if I'm wrong about that, there are two additional factors to consider. SMS messages (even if they include pictures) use much less bandwidth than calls. Also, mobile carriers use traffic engineering techniques to prioritize messages appropriately.