[ikka]

It could be that the cell system is not down, but that the cell phone company has switched the system over to emergency mode, which gives the police and other emergency agencies priority use of the system.

[WhyisaTexasgirlinPA]

I'm certainly not trying to argue with either of you - I'm only commenting based on expert information from my husband, who has worked in the Cell industry for many years - ikka, you mentioned the cells possibly being switched over for municipal use - this is what my husband said:

Nextel is the only system that inferes with public systems - they are currently at 800 Mhz, all other systems are at 1900 - so a widescale switch would not have been necessary.