'wi-fi refugees' shelter in west virginia mountains

'technological lepers' seek refuge in mountains of west virginia*

from allgov: For those physically affected by wireless signals, the place to go is in a remote part of West Virginia made possible by the U.S. government.

In the small town of Green Bank (population: 143), residents can live free of wireless signals. Exposure to Wi-Fi and mobile phone communications can cause a variety of ailments to about 5% of Americans who suffer from Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity (EHS).

Although the cell phone and Wi-Fi industries insist that the condition is purely psychological, sufferers of EHS insist that its symptoms range from acute headaches and skin burning to muscle twitching and chronic pain.

But in the Allegheny Mountains, Green Bank’s populace doesn’t have to worry about EHS. That’s because they live within the National Radio Quiet Zone, where wireless is banned across 13,000 square miles to prevent transmissions interfering with several radio telescopes, including those of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and others used by the military and spy agencies at the U.S. Navy Information Operations Command (NIOC) at Sugar Grove. The quiet zone was established in 1958.

For anyone not living in a place like Green Bank, they must resort to staying indoors, literally separated from the rest of the world using a Faraday Cage, built of wire mesh that blocks out radio waves.