When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, families and friends of the region’s college students anxiously awaited word of their safety and whereabouts. The Internet, usually a reliable source of information, provided no comfort as the storm had decimated the region’s telecommunications infrastructure.
As a result of that experience, Rhode Island is scrutinizing its own infrastructure.
OSHEAN, which stands for Ocean State Higher Education, Economic Development and Administrative Network, is a nonprofit that provides technical solutions, such as high-speed Internet services to colleges, hospitals, government agencies and other organizations in Rhode Island and southeastern Massachusetts. In collaboration with the Northeast Regional Education Network, it is creating “safe harbor” Web sites to allow colleges and other institutions to remotely update their sites and get out vital information in case of a disaster.
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While the focus seems to lean heavily on institutions of higher education, health care providers such as Care New England and Lifespan are also taking part in the initiative. It will “provide hospitals with a critical tool for communicating health and safety information in case of disaster,” said Howard Rubin, director of IS technical services for Care New England. “Safe harbors will allow hospitals to give patients and their families – as well as the community at large – the knowledge they need to stay safe and to access our services,” he said.
“The idea is to ensure [members] have a presence on the Web to which they can communicate with many constituents around the world should an event occur that disrupts normal activities, whether it be a fire, flood, terrorist attack, pandemic or extended power outage,” said George Loftus, executive director of OSHEAN.
The two groups have reached out to counterparts in other states, including Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York, to make this initiative happen. The organizations plan to connect on a statewide level, and that’s where NEREN comes into play.
NEREN provides a large-capacity fiber-optic cable loop that runs from New York City north through Hartford, Providence, Boston, and west to Springfield and Albany, and south from Albany back to New York City, connecting these communities and their institutions. A large Internet connection is imperative because when disaster strikes, sites will act as communications vehicles and will get tons of hits.
Mirrored images of member Web sites will be stored on servers in Springfield in the event that servers in Providence fail, immediately re-routing the site visitor. And while the visitor will be viewing the institution’s Web site, it won’t be as graphically sophisticated as the standard one. It is designed to convey emergency information.
During Hurricane Katrina, this type of remote access was successful for Tulane University in New Orleans. The university was able to remotely update its Web site from a location in Houston and send out pertinent information to family and friends of the students.
But if the infrastructure goes down in Springfield, Loftus said, “that doesn’t help our friends in Springfield.” Realizing this, a second location to host the information is planned farther inland, most likely in Syracuse or Albany.
OSHEAN’s board of directors will initially fund this project with approved funds from reserves of approximately $40,000. The funds will cover housing equipment and transmission in Springfield.
“We are excited to be able to offer this to our members and to offer another solution that’s best implemented through collaboration rather than members doing it on their own,” Loftus said.
