PSK31 is a NICE mode - I play with it, and it works.

That said, the Man who coordinated the Salvation Army's Communications post Katrina came and spoke at our ARES meeting yesterday - very interesting. When he first went down, he thought he was only going to be doing Ham Comms - turns out they wanted him for ALL comms

He says the thing that went the MOST right was Winlink2000 - which is not a mode, but a system. In HF, Winlink is mostly setup to run PactorII and PactorIII, but in disasters, they usually enable Pactor I. Pactor II and III are GREAT high speed modes, but have a BIG problem - the price of the modem (figure $850 for the cheapest one!!) That said, he said it was an invaluable tool, and intends to setup a PIII PMBO/VHF relay to HF in his house ASAP (which will give NYC a full time HF PMBO)

PSK31 works - but for full fledged disaster comms is actually too slow - It will work for getting personal stuff out - but if you intend to assist others, figure PII or PIII

For a quick explaination of what the Winlink system is - picture I go into a disaster area with a radio and a computer - on the computer, I setup a POP3 and SMTP server (aka email) and hook it to the radio (HF or VHF) - the workers at the shelter/OEM/wherever can then hook their PCs to mine (aka standard network) - and hookup to the email accounts that I give them - using normal email programs like Outlook. My radio sends the message to a station OUTSIDE the disaster area - and it goes out on the internet as normal email - the message is delivered right to the person who needs it, in a way they are used to - complete with attachments!! They can reply, and it will come back the next time my radio polls for email!! In short, Winlink2000 gives us the ability to bring email into disaster areas - proved to work real well for logistics for the Salvation Army