On September 18, the Steering Committee for Natural Disaster Prevention, Search and Rescue and Civil Defense of the Ministry of Information and Communications issued Official Dispatch 07 requesting the Departments of Information and Communications of 17 provinces and cities including Quang Ninh, Hai Phong, Thai Binh, Nam Dinh, Ninh Binh, Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri, Thua Thien Hue, Da Nang, Quang Nam, Quang Ngai, Binh Dinh, Phu Yen, Khanh Hoa, along with units under the Ministry of Information and Communications and postal and telecommunications enterprises to proactively respond to the tropical depression that is likely to strengthen into a storm.

Accordingly, in parallel with urgently overcoming the consequences of storm No. 3 and the floods after the storm, the units of the Information and Communications sector must strictly implement the regime of leadership on duty, command on duty for natural disaster prevention and search and rescue, information response on duty 24/7, and closely monitor the developments of the tropical depression.

Along with assigning specific tasks to units under the Ministry of Information and Communications, including the Department of Telecommunications, Press, Broadcasting and Electronic Information, Central Post Office and Postal Department, the Ministry of Information and Communications also clearly guides the tasks that 17 Departments of Information and Communications and enterprises need to focus on.

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Da Nang and a number of provinces and cities have now regularly updated information on natural disasters and flooding on their local smart city and digital citizen applications. Photo: NQ

Specifically, the Departments of Information and Communications of provinces and cities direct local radio and television stations to update the tropical depression forecast bulletin from the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting, increase the duration and frequency of broadcasting forecast bulletins to promptly notify people to proactively prevent and control; act as the focal point to direct local postal and telecommunications enterprises to coordinate and synchronously deploy timely response plans and meet the communication needs of the leaders of the People's Committee, the Civil Defense Command of the province, city and local authorities to direct and operate the response to tropical depression.

The Departments of Information and Communications are also responsible for identifying areas that have lost communication due to the impact of the tropical depression to coordinate with the Department of Telecommunications to direct mobile telecommunications enterprises to deploy roaming between networks to ensure smooth communication for command, operation, and response; inform the Department of Industry and Trade of areas that need priority for grid power for BTS stations that can withstand level 4 natural disasters to ensure the maintenance of communication.

At the same time, the Department of Industry and Trade is requested to direct petroleum supply enterprises to support and prioritize the supply of petroleum to telecommunications enterprises in the area to serve the operation of generators for BTS stations when the grid power is lost.

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During the recent storm No. 3, the storm caused a loss of communication in 15 northern localities, with 6,285 BTS stations affected by power outages. Photo: Trong Dat

Telecommunications businesses must immediately deploy measures to ensure the safety of the communication system to serve the direction and response to tropical depressions, develop information response plans when incidents occur; be ready to send warning messages to subscribers in areas that may be affected upon request; be ready to roam between mobile networks upon request and instruct people on how to set up their phones to automatically roam between mobile networks; develop plans to mobilize human resources, vehicles, equipment, and spare materials to quickly restore the network after natural disasters...

At the same time, focus on reinforcing station houses, high masts, antenna masts of radio transmitters, radio receivers, transmission systems and peripheral networks that are likely to be affected by the tropical depression; promptly supplement backup equipment on the network such as generators, generator fuel, batteries for units in the area expected to be directly affected by the tropical depression.

VNPT was directed to review satellite equipment to be ready to respond to information to serve the direction and operation of preventing and combating tropical depressions. Meanwhile, Vishipel was required to proactively coordinate with the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting to broadcast tropical depression forecast bulletins; strictly maintain the emergency and emergency information watchdog regime, especially for fishing vessels, by voice on emergency and emergency frequencies, promptly receive and transfer information to the receiving addresses according to regulations...

According to information shared by the Department of Telecommunications at the regular press conference of September 2024 of the Ministry of Information and Communications, storm No. 3 caused communication loss in 15 provinces and cities, with 6,285 mobile base transceiver stations - BTS affected by power outages. Floods after storm No. 3 also affected telecommunications infrastructure in the northern mountainous provinces with 995 stations losing communication, as of the afternoon of September 11.

Using digital citizen applications to support people in coping with floods after typhoon Yagi The Ministry of Information and Communications recommends that Departments of Information and Communications use their local digital transformation achievements such as digital citizen applications on smartphones to regularly update information and guide people on skills to prevent and respond to floods after typhoon Yagi.