Warning issued by authorities to the public en masse
Public warning system siren in Dresden, Germany
An emergency population warning, or public warning system is a method where by local, regional, or national authorities can contact or notify members of the public to warn them of an impending emergency. These warnings may be necessary for a number of reasons, including:
In order to develop an effective emergency warning system, certain things are required:
an agreement as to what constitutes an emergency in the area served by the system. This differs from region to region depending on the local climate, geology, and the like.
an agreement as to who can initiate an alert. In some countries all warnings are transmitted by a single command center, while in other larger countries a host of local, regional, and national agencies can be authorized to initiate warnings.
a system or systems by which the information can be quickly transmitted to the population. Including the method and technology used.
an education program to teach the general public how to recognize an alert or what to do if a warning is broadcast.
The United Nations Development Programme uses the Send Word Now Emergency Notification System to alert its worldwide staff when an urgent situation arises.[2]
The Standard Emergency Warning Signal was originally adopted by the Bureau of Meteorology in the 1970s for tropical cyclone warnings. It became a standard national emergency warning signal in 1995. It can be broadcast on radio, television, automated telephone calls and in some places by public address systems in the event of bushfire, flood, cyclone, tsunami, earthquake or terrorist attack.
Canada
On June 11, 2009, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) approved a proposal by Pelmorex, owners of The Weather Network and MétéoMédia, to receive must-carry status for the channels, in exchange for developing a "national aggregator and distributor" of localized emergency alert messages compliant with the Common Alerting Protocol. The alert system, known as Alert Ready, built on a backend known as the National Alert Aggregation and Dissemination system (NAAD), was first established in 2010, and further expanded as a result of consultation with government officials, broadcasters, and the CRTC. In August 2014, the CRTC ruled that all television stations, radio stations, and broadcast distribution undertakings had to begin mandatory carriage of local alerts relayed through NAAD by March 31, 2015.[3][4][5]
The province of Alberta had its own system called the Emergency Public Warning System (EPWS). The EPWS was put into place after a major tornado swept through the city of Edmonton in 1987, killing 27 and causing millions of dollars in damage. Unlike the American EAS, however, broadcast of the EPWS was not mandatory on radio and television stations. It was broadcast on the CKUA Radio Network and was televised on CTV Two Alberta and other participating stations. EPWS warnings could be initiated by municipal police and fire departments, the provincial government, county authorities, tribal government agencies, Environment Canada, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. CKUA developed and maintained the EPWS until January 2010, when it lost a bid to modernize the system to an outside vendor (the contract had provided 15% of the station's overall budget).[6]
In June 2011, an updated version of the system known as Alberta Emergency Alert was introduced, which emphasized multi-platform availability of alerts and advisories on digital platforms, such as online and through a mobile app.[7] Participation in AEA is now considered mandatory under the CRTC's national public alerting mandate.[8]
France
Alert signal in FranceEnd of alert signal in France
In France, the population warning is made via air raid siren. This network is called the "Réseau national d'alerte" (RNA). The system is inherited from the air-raid siren network (défense passive) developed before World War II. It consists of about 4,500 electronic or electromechanical sirens placed all over France.
In some cases, the warning signal may be played by a mobile system installed on the fire department's vehicles.
The warning signal is described by décret (by law) of March 23, 2007. It consists in a modulated sound going up and down (up to 380Hz) during the first minute, and repeated three times. The end of alert is a continuous signal lasting 30 seconds.
The system is tested the first Wednesday of every month at 11.45 in the north, 12.00 in the center, and at 12.15 in the south; for tests, the modulated signal is played only once.
When the warning signal sounds, people are expected to remain at home or the building they are in and listen to further instructions on radio via France Info, France Inter, or local stations.
Instructions may also be announced by police or fire department vehicles.
FR-Alert
FR-Alert is a national-level mobile risk alert and emergency communication system implemented by Intersec[9] in partnership with the Ministry of the Interior in France. This system is designed to facilitate the efficient dissemination of critical alerts and safety information to citizens throughout the country. FR-Alert serves as a platform for delivering timely and accurate notifications related to various potential risks, including natural disasters and industrial incidents.
Iran
Iranian armed forces texts are sent on several occasions. Also texts are sent by US just as well.[10][11]
The J-Alert system launched in 2007 aims to allow government officials to address the population directly via loudspeakers. It aims to cover earthquake, tsunami, volcano, and military emergencies.
The Earthquake Early Warning system is operated by the Japan Meteorological Agency. It is capable of delivering warnings a few seconds before S-waves can propagate to distant locations. Warnings are broadcast by radio and television stations, and compatible equipment can automatically turn on when receiving a message. EEW capability is also required for all domestic cell phones sold after 2007.
JMA also issues advisories regarding tropical cyclones in the western Pacific Ocean.
Many countries in South America have a mechanism called "cadena nacional" (Spanish: national broadcast). It enables the leader of the country to address the people simultaneously on all TV channels and radio stations, interrupting normal programming. In some countries, such as Argentina and Venezuela, the broadcast of these messages is obligatory. Many of these systems were created by past military governments, and political use of the mechanism is common.
Chile
The SAE (Spanish: Sistema de Alerta de Emergencia; English: Emergency Alert System) was created as a response to the 2010 Chilean Earthquake after the failure by the national authorities to provide safety precautions and speedy information during the aftermath of the disaster. Since its inception in 2012 and through its official implementation in 2017 onwards, it has been used to provide alerts and information regarding natural disasters such as floods, wildfires, tsunami and earthquake warnings. All cell phones on sale in the country are required by law to be compatible with the SAE system since 2017.
Between 1953 and 1992, the UK government had an alert system known as the "four-minute warning". Its purpose was to warn the population, through a combination of air-raid sirens and messages over television and radio, of an impending nuclear missile attack from the Soviet Union; its name derived from the expected amount of time between knowledge of the strike and the missile landing. The system was dismantled following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.
In 2013, the government conducted trials of a public alert system using both SMS messaging and Cell Broadcast technology to send alert messages to mobile devices in areas affected by an emergency. A report was published in 2014 that said the trials were successful and that 85% of people thought that such a system would be a good idea, as well as detailing how such a system could be implemented, and plans for further trials. However, no further trials or implementation of the system came.
On 24 March 2020, the day after the UK went into a national lockdown in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the government collaborated with the country's four main mobile networks, O2, EE, Vodafone and Three, to send a text message alert regarding the new restrictions to all registered mobile phone numbers across the UK.[12] In order to not overwhelm the networks, the operators sent the messages in batches, going to one million or so numbers at a time. This process took over 24 hours, with some people not receiving the message until the following day. The government was accused of ignoring its own advice from the 2013 trials to set up a dedicated public alert system.[13] In response, it began developing a system using Cell Broadcast technology.
In March 2021, a test flood alert was sent using the new technology to devices in Reading. Another generic test alert was sent to O2 customers on 11 May.[14] Certain BT Mobile customers (with BT Mobile operating on the EE network) received two alerts on 20 May. A more public test of the system was carried out for devices in East Suffolk on 25 May, followed by a test across the UK on 12 June.[15] Further limited tests were sent on 18 and 22 June. All of these test messages were sent specifically marked as operator test alerts, meaning that not all devices receive them. They are received by devices that have the option to receive test alerts turned on in the device settings, and some devices do not have this option.
The first test alert marked as an actual alert, meaning it will be received by all compatible devices in the given area, was sent on 29 June, again only to devices in Reading.[16] Because this alert would be received by most mobile devices in the Reading area, this alert was given more publicity, with the Cabinet Office posting notices on social media,[17] as well as some mobile networks.[18] Further operator tests were carried out throughout July, August and September. The sound they use is exactly the same as the one in the US, some phones will beep three times before the message is read out, whilst other phones will signal a pattern for 10 seconds. There is no mention if alerts would be broadcast on TV or radio.
The government initially planned to make the system fully live and functional in the summer of 2021, but this was later changed to autumn of 2021, and then again delayed to early 2022 and then the summer 2022,[19] with a publicised nationwide alert sent to all devices to demonstrate the system. A nationwide test of the system took place at 15:00 BST on the 23rd April 2023.[20] Alerts were received by all mobile devices connected to 4G and 5G networks, running Android 11 or later or iOS 14.5 or later.[21] Some older Android devices, as well as other makes and models of phones, also received the alerts. The alert was received by most mobile phones between 14:59 and 15:05 BST, however some mobile devices on the Three network did not receive the alert.[22]
The bulk of emergency warnings in the United States are sent through the Emergency Alert System, implemented in 1997. The EAS can be activated by national, state, regional, or local authorities, including police, fire, weather, and other governmental authorities. EAS is often activated when an unpredicted emergency such as a tornado, earthquake, or release of toxic gas happens. The vast majority of EAS alerts are generated by the National Weather Service.
Many states use existing air raid sirens to warn of tornadoes and flash floods. People living near certain nuclear facilities such as the Hanford Site in Washington have special radios in their home that are set to broadcast a warning signal in the event of a radiological emergency. Some emergencies (AMBER Alerts, for instance) are also sent out via e-mail, cellphone text message, and highway signs. Many U.S. institutions of higher education now use multiple warning technologies on their campuses, including outdoor and indoor sirens, public address systems, email and cell phone text messaging, and digital displays.[23]
A notable example of an emergency alert being issued in the United States was a nationwide alert test, known as the National Periodic Test, which last occurred on October 4, 2023.
A civil defense siren is a siren used to provide an emergency population warning to the general population of approaching danger. Initially designed to warn city dwellers of air raids during World War II, they were later used to warn of nuclear attack and natural disasters, such as tornadoes. The generalized nature of sirens led to many of them being replaced with more specific warnings, such as the broadcast-based Emergency Alert System and the Cell Broadcast-based Wireless Emergency Alerts and EU-Alert mobile technologies.
The Emergency Broadcast System (EBS), sometimes called the Emergency Action Notification System (EANS), was an emergency warning system used in the United States. It was the most commonly used, along with the Emergency Override system. It replaced the previous CONELRAD system and was used from 1963 to 1997, at which point it was replaced by the Emergency Alert System.
CONELRAD was a method of emergency broadcasting to the public of the United States in the event of enemy attack during the Cold War. It was intended to allow continuous broadcast of civil defense information to the public using radio stations, while rapidly switching the transmitter stations to make the broadcasts unsuitable for Soviet bombers that might attempt to home in on the signals.
The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a national warning system in the United States designed to allow authorized officials to broadcast emergency alerts and warning messages to the public via cable, satellite and broadcast television and AM, FM and satellite radio. Informally, Emergency Alert System is sometimes conflated with its mobile phone counterpart Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA), a different but related system. However, both the EAS and WEA, among other systems, are coordinated under the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS). The EAS, and more broadly IPAWS, allows federal, state, and local authorities to efficiently broadcast emergency alert and warning messages across multiple channels. The EAS became operational on January 1, 1997, after being approved by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in November 1994, replacing the Emergency Broadcast System (EBS), and largely supplanted Local Access Alert systems, though Local Access Alert systems are still used from time to time. Its main improvement over the EBS, and perhaps its most distinctive feature, is its application of a digitally encoded audio signal known as Specific Area Message Encoding (SAME), which is responsible for the characteristic "screeching" or "chirping" sounds at the start and end of each message. The first signal is the "header" which encodes, among other information, the alert type and locations, or the specific area that should receive the message. The last short burst marks the end-of-message. These signals are read by specialized encoder-decoder equipment. This design allows for automated station-to-station relay of alerts to only the area the alert was intended for.
Specific Area Message Encoding (SAME) is a protocol used for framing and classification of broadcasting emergency warning messages. It was developed by the United States National Weather Service for use on its NOAA Weather Radio (NWR) network, and was later adopted by the Federal Communications Commission for the Emergency Alert System, then subsequently by Environment Canada for use on its Weatheradio Canada service. It is also used to set off receivers in Mexico City and surrounding areas as part of the Mexican Seismic Alert System (SASMEX).
A weather radio is a specialized radio receiver that is designed to receive a public broadcast service, typically from government-owned radio stations, dedicated to broadcasting weather forecasts and reports on a continual basis, with the routine weather reports being interrupted by emergency weather reports whenever needed. Weather radios are typically equipped with a standby alerting function—if the radio is muted or tuned to another band and a severe weather bulletin is transmitted, it can automatically sound an alarm and/or switch to a pre-tuned weather channel for emergency weather information. Weather radio services may also occasionally broadcast non-weather-related emergency information, such as in the event of a natural disaster, a child abduction alert, or a terrorist attack.
The Digital Emergency Alert System (DEAS) was a system managed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and designed to alert first-responders and civilians in the event of a national emergency. It was based upon and supplemented the Emergency Alert System (EAS) by sending out text, voice, video, and other digital messages to mobile phones, pagers, radios, and televisions.
Cell Broadcast (CB) is a method of sending short messages to multiple mobile telephone users in a defined area at the same time. It is defined by the ETSI's GSM committee and 3GPP and is part of the 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G standards. It is also known as Short Message Service-Cell Broadcast . Unlike Short Message Service-Point to Point (SMS-PP), Cell Broadcast is a one-to-many geo-targeted and geo-fenced messaging service. Cell Broadcast technology is widely used for public warning systems.
The Standard Emergency Warning Signal (SEWS) is a warning siren used in Australia to alert the public of danger. The siren is played over radio, television or public address systems in public places to warn of bushfire, flood, cyclone, tsunami, earthquake or terrorist attack.
J-Alert is the early warning system used in Japan. J-Alert was launched in February 2007. The system is designed to quickly inform the public of threats and emergencies such as earthquakes, severe weather, and other dangers. The system was developed in the hope that early warnings would speed up evacuation times and help coordinate emergency response.
Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA), formerly known as the Commercial Mobile Alert System (CMAS), and prior to that as the Personal Localized Alerting Network (PLAN), is an alerting network in the United States designed to disseminate emergency alerts to cell phones using Cell Broadcast technology. Organizations are able to disseminate and coordinate emergency alerts and warning messages through WEA and other public systems by means of the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System.
The Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) is an architecture that unifies the United States' Emergency Alert System, National Warning System, Wireless Emergency Alerts, and NOAA Weather Radio, under a single platform. IPAWS was designed to modernize these systems by enabling alerts to be aggregated over a network and distributed to the appropriate system for public dissemination.
An emergency communication system (ECS) is any system that is organized for the primary purpose of supporting one-way and two-way communication of emergency information between both individuals and groups of individuals. These systems are commonly designed to convey information over multiple types of devices, from signal lights to text messaging to live, streaming video, forming a unified communication system intended to optimize communications during emergencies. Contrary to emergency notification systems, which generally deliver emergency information in one direction, emergency communication systems are typically capable of both initiating and receiving information between multiple parties. These systems are often made up of both input devices, sensors, and output/communication devices. Therefore, the origination of information can occur from a variety of sources and locations, from which the system will disseminate that information to one or more target audiences.
Alberta Emergency Alert (AEA) was a public warning system in Alberta. The system was implemented in October 2011, replacing the former Alberta Emergency Public Warning System (EPWS). Based on Common Alerting Protocol (CAP), alerts were disseminated through various media outlets including television and radio, internet, social media mobile apps, and cell broadcast.
The National Public Alerting System, branded as Alert Ready, is the national warning system in Canada, broadcast to Canadian television, radio, and wireless devices.
Emergency Mobile Alerts (EMA) is an alerting network in New Zealand designed to disseminate emergency alerts to mobile devices. Emergency Mobile Alerts are messages about emergencies sent by New Zealand authorised emergency agencies to capable mobile phones. The alerts are sent to participating wireless providers who will distribute the alerts to their customers with compatible devices via Cell Broadcast, a technology best suitable for public warning as it simultaneously delivers messages to all phones using a Mobile Cell tower. Similar solutions are implemented in the United States, The Netherlands (NL-Alert), European Union (EU-Alert), Canada, Japan, Taiwan, Chile, Philippines. One2many B.V. provides this modern Emergency Mobile Alert system including the Cell Broadcast systems and the CAP based centralised Public Warning management system.
EU-Alert is a Public Warning System designed to disseminate emergency alerts to mobile phones based on Cell Broadcast technology, as defined by ETSI standards. National authorities are able to disseminate emergency alerts and warning messages through the system. EU-Alert is a standard designed for interoprability and national implementation may vary. The standards are based on NL-Alert from the Netherlands, which first became operational in 2012.
Emergency Cell Broadcast System (ECBS) is an alert broadcast system in the Philippines, designed to disseminate emergency alerts and warnings to mobile devices via cell broadcast services (CBS)
There are various Wireless Emergency Alerts in Germany which inform citizens about important incidents, disasters and dangerous situations, as well as severe weather. Since February 2023, the alerts of the four main systems have been shared and disseminated in parallel.
The United Kingdom's mobile phone alert system is a public population warning system that uses Cell Broadcast technology. The warning system is intended for use in major incidents such as flooding or terror attacks. The Emergency Alert System was launched on 19 March 2023, and tested on a nationwide basis for the first time on 23 April 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
