Your Love is Like a Hurricane

Any Neil Young fans out there? Yes, no, maybe? Suffice it say that as I watched Gustav come into the Gulf, my stomach in one large knot in fear for a city I love so much drowning once again, I couldn’t get the frickin’ song out of my head. It just seems incongruous. Love should never be like a hurricane, unless it’s one of those fun Category 1 numbers that always spawn video pictures of people in Key West frolicking in some seriously gnarly waves, dude.

But Sprint-Nextel Corp. wants you to feel the hurricane love of a different sort. The sort that says, hey, potential hurricane victims? We care. We do. Make sure you charge extra cell batteries, ‘kay?

New Orleans dodged the bullet this time — though Gustav’s threat does beg the question, why weren’t those carcinogenic FEMA trailers made to be amphibious, kind of like duck tour boats? Not only does it make solid threat prep sense, but their occupants could make a buck or two in the tourist season while waiting for a) jobs to return and b) those nonexistent insurance checks. But I digress.

So anyway, New Orleans dodged a bullet, but there’s no guarantee it will next time. And even so, in rural coastal Cajun country the damage from Gustav is extensive. And meanwhile, Hurricane Hanna (points for alliteration!) is threatening to make landfall along the Atlantic coast on Friday. Learning from Katrina – which knocked out all terrestrial communications, including cell towers – plunging into oblivion everything from the average citizens’ calls to mission-critical comms at hospitals. Sprint says that this time, it’s prepared.

Yeah, yeah, that’s what they all say, right? Well actually, no. You have the various satellite providers in their traditional role as the communications of last resort in such situations, but I haven’t gotten any other news about hurricane preparation across my desk, even as we have two storms pounding the coasts in the same week.

But in a battle plan worthy of Napoleon BEFORE he decided to invade Russia, Sprint says network teams are working around the clock assessing the situation in Louisiana following Hurricane Gustav and moving in portable generators as needed. Those back-up generators and personnel are staged in strategic locations in the Southeast to manage potential service impacts. In addition, the aptly titled “Sprint Service and Repair Van” is ready to travel to the impacted markets and assist customers with their wireless needs, including providing service and repair, accessories, back-up batteries and phone calls via cell sites on wheels – mobile cell sites that can be deployed in impacted areas to restore service quickly. And a whole bunch of other stuff that I just kind of skimmed in the reading materials.

Anyway, I think it’s nice to see corporate citizenry taking charge. “Sprinty, you’re doing a heck of a job” it isn’t. And for some reason I’m not feeling cynical about it, like oh, this is just self-serving to avoid being out the minutes of use, etc.

...Napoleon? Russia? Is that too “thinky?” I’m feeling insecure in my bloggishness, so tell me you love me. But not like a hurricane.

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