Blackberry on 9/11

Today is September 11, 2009 and that marks the 8th anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City.  During and after the attacks telecommunications were almost completely knocked out surrounding the towers.  Phone lines that were open flooded with calls and were completely jammed.  Radios weren’t working effectively, and most cell users on major networks could not even get their calls to send.  Everybody from the NYFD to the NY Times was struggling to communicate.

That’s before somebody got an email.  Thru the chaos and pandemonium that ensued on the ground in lower Manhattan the morning of 9-11-2001, that little electronic device kept right on working. 

At the time a vast number of Blackberry users operated on a private network not tied to the big cell providers.  This was setup by RIM when it originally launched the Blackberry product.  This allowed everyone from the Sales reps to Emergency personnel to communicate that day by simply pushing send on their Blackberry.

The Blackberry was one of the only communication tools that worked with little to no interruption of service that day in lower Manhattan.
It was without doubt, technology at its very best.

Today we remember the lives lost, the people who helped, and the technology they used to do it.