Do cell phones work during a blackout?

BRY2K

Yes and no. Those charged with batteries would likely work for the duraration of the life of the batteries but but cell phones are notoriously unreliable during an outage. http://ww3.nysif.com/nysifmedia/pdf/safetyresources/safetycop/3_5_5_10_make%20sure%20you%E2%80%99re%20never%20left%20in%20the%20dark%20final.pdf Nov 09 09, 6:39 PM

Datsmeharse

Thanks -- I was wondering if cell phone towers use their own power generators or not; I'd assume a blacked-out tower wouldn't carry a signal. It's all a mystery to me. Nov 09 09, 6:45 PM

BRY2K

Likewise,D. Nov 09 09, 7:27 PM

Arpeggionist

For the record, it was only at 2pm that I finally managed to established contact with my family overseas on September 11th, 2001, on a landline - I couldn't find a single working cellphone in New York City after the World Trade Center had filled up with ash and communications were interrupted everywhere. Had the building whee the phone calls were being patched to remained undisturbed that day, I would have likely been able to call my family much sooner, but I had no such luck. So it really depends which building is being affected by the blackout. Nov 09 09, 9:42 PM

dj168

For me it works, when there was a blackout I could use my cell phone to call people. Thing is though a lot of the towers were bombarded by calls so laggy and bad reception. Nov 09 09, 10:31 PM