I was thinking of a real bad disaster and the State Dept being able to be an intermediary with the outside world. The State Dept having passport and personal info could be useful. I registered 4 years ago specific to Turkey. Haven't been in contact since them. I assume they still have my info? Hadn't thought about that.

OK I think it is a good idea, I was in Zaire once, old Belgian Congo, and it was a tad unsettled under Mobutu, with guys with sort of machine guns/at least looked like them, to me, directing traffic. The state dept site asked that we check into the US embassy and give our itinerary to them in Kinshasa. We checked the current status of the situation and what to avoid on the state dept site.Made me feel better while there, but probably wouldn't have helped much as there were two Marines guarding the embassy when we were there. We did have to show passports,etc. Sue

I travel with college students and find STEP helpful. They will notify you of demonstrations, etc. and their locations in the city you are visiting. They have even commented upon whether a situation might become dangerous. As I am responsible for many young lives, I will take all the help I can get!

I have no interest in giving the US government any more information about my whereabouts than I have to. If I were planning travel to somewhere I considered so dangerous I needed to be in contact with the embassy I would go somewhere else - I did cancel a side trip to Tunisia during the Arab Spring. If things turn bad during a trip I would contact the embassy myself - I wound up in Pakistan right after 9-11 and I did contact my embassy (British at the time) in case I needed help leaving (I didn't). And I did contact the US non-embassy on Taiwan when I arrived just ahead of a typhoon (the contact wanted me to go to Taipei but turned out I was better off where I was).

I would not necessarily expect a lot of help, in any case. I remember reading reports from survivors after the Costa Concordia sinking that the US citizens were treated very much worse than citizens of other countries. For instance, they had to get themselves to the embassy instead of help coming to them, despite possibly having no money.