At the end of a recent post I made a throwaway reference to the Dumbo Project, with the following eye catching image:

Having now read into the DUMBO project a bit more, what they are attempting to implement is pure brilliance.  I've read a couple of their publications, but I recommend reading  this one as an introduction to what the DUMBO project is hoping to acheive.

The gist of the project is to create efficient wireless mesh networks - and link them via satellite to enable fast re-building of communication infrastructure in the event of a disaster.  DUMBO have extended this idea though, and are also working on applications to work on top of this mesh - simple low-bandwidth applications tailor-made for disaster situation requirements.

It looks like a great project, and one I'll be keeping my eyes and ears on in the future.  Great work guys.