Katrina's Proving To Be A Tough Test For Technology; Many Outages, Many Lifelines; Local phone, Net links may be spotty for a while; social networker finds needed aid.(INTERNET & TECHNOLOGY)

Publication: Investor's Business Daily

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COPYRIGHT 2005 Investor's Business Daily, Inc.

Byline: DONNA HOWELL

Water, wind and wires make a bad mix.

Hurricane Katrina tangled with technology as it blew into Louisiana Monday. The storm spurred power, phone and Internet outages that could linger. On the plus side, technology, from radar to cell phones, provided a lifeline to people trying to escape the storm.

"The value of technology was in the warning time and the specificity. But when the hurricane hit, everything broke down," said George Friedman, chairman of Stratfor, which provides intelligence and analysis to...

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