[Chicos_Bail_Bonds]

I spoke with a colleague this morning who is from London. She said that this morning none of the cell phones were working. Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals. They spoke of doing that during the conventions at one point.

[MizSterious]

I heard that on Fox at one point, too. I wondered the same, and wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

[Cousin Eddie]

I've heard that the problem stemmed from everyone trying to make calls at once. The cell networks are only designed to handle a fraction of the phones at any point in time. Too many callers = outages for many people.

[LenS]

You wouldn't need an EMP -- just have the cellphone companies with nearby towers go ahead and shut them down. There's usually only a couple of networks in any given area -- so it's probably now SOP in the midst of a bombing run.

[jamz]

Doubt it...as soon as the bombs started going off...you KNOW the cell lines were slammed. Remember 9/11. The terrorists probably got a busy signal trying to call their bombs to go off.

Trick is attempting to salvage the bomb while keeping everyone safe. If there is any question...they'll just detonate the thing.

EMP would've destroyed everything in an area electronically that wasn't shielded...highly unlikely.

[Shermy]

"I spoke with a colleague this morning who is from London. She said that this morning none of the cell phones were working."

Interesting. The Madrid bombers used cell phone ringers or such. Perhaps when the first bomb goes off there's a "switch" turning off all cell phones as a security precaution.

[Spktyr]

It's simpler than that - they just shut down the cell towers remotely. It's all in the tower equipment's software. Normally, it's used to remove a misbehaving tower from service until a tech can get out there and service it.

If you turn off all the towers in an area, what you have left is a bunch of paperweights.

[Straight Vermonter]

Not EMP, just a flip of a switch and the cells are off.

[jz638]

Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals.

One of the news stations (I wasn't listening too closely to the details so I could have heard it wrong) mentioned that the Brits have some sort of emergency system that narrows the available bandwidth for civilian phone signals in the event of a disaster such as this so that the phone calls of first responders can get through better.

[evad]

She said that this morning none of the cell phones were working. Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals. They spoke of doing that during the conventions at one point.

hmmm...more likely a result of everyone trying to use their cellphones at the same time.

[Haru Hara Haruko]

The "new technology" is called shutting down the network. It would take less than a minute to shut the networks down if such an emergency had been planned for.

[dljordan]

"I spoke with a colleague this morning who is from London. She said that this morning none of the cell phones were working. Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals. They spoke of doing that during the conventions at one point."

They have software that can be used to turn off all cell phone transmitters in order to prevent anyone detonating a bomb by using a cell phone. It's not an EMP device. It's old technology.

[Kozak]

Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals. They spoke of doing that during the conventions at one point.

Not EMP. They just turn off the cell towers to "normal" traffic, they get used for the emergency services instead. Also prevents the bastards from triggering delayed bombs designed to kill the rescue workers.

[Conservative4Ever]

This very thing happened with our cell phones when we had the Yucaipa earthquake a few weeks ago. Cell service just quit. Expect this to happen when emergencies occur. The emergency personnel commandeer the phone lines for emergency use. Mr. C4E and I carry good old CB radios. With short distance they work great.

Red

[BurbankKarl]

the cell phones were likely overwhelmed with callers....like after the earthquake here in CA....all circuits busy

[Let's Roll]

I believe they also did it for the 2-3 days surrounding the Iraqi elections.

[Fido969]

YOu wouldn't even need an EMP, just shut off all the towers.

[xkaydet65]

It wasn't EMP. The Brits simply shut down the transmission and repeater arrays. That just takes a notification to the carriers by a simple code.

[adam_az]

"I spoke with a colleague this morning who is from London. She said that this morning none of the cell phones were working. Could this be because of the new technology that we have (I assume the British too) where we can put out an EMP of sorts that turns off the cell signals."

It's done either by overpowering the cell phone frequencies with noise, or else by just turning off cell towers in an area.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

If you look at the original posts on this terrorist incident on freerepublic you will see that apparently British authorities were announcing a power outage before they were announcing a terrorist attack.

This I would think would be consistent with an EMP attack, however I suspect there would have been more trouble with an EMP attack, and that an attack without an EMP device would knock out power to immediate areas, but who knows?