Wireless Emergency Alerts played a large part in authorities finding the suspect in the recent New York and New Jersey bombings. Inside Towers reported it was one of the most high-profile, and large-scale uses of the wireless alerts.
It was unconventional, too, as city authorities called for citizens to be vigilant while the manhunt was underway. Local, state and national use of wireless emergency alerts is growing, according to WAMC.org. FEMA’s Deputy Director of the Program management Office for its Integrated Public Alert and Warning System says non-federal authorities had more wireless alerts this year than any since the WEA system launched in 2012.
Typically, local emergency authorities initiate non-weather alerts. FEMA connects those to wireless carriers over a secure computer network. Using cell towers in a certain geographic area specified by authorities, carriers actually send the alert.
The alert looks like a text message on the individuals’ phones, but it uses a different channel on the carrier networks to prevent network congestion, according to the wireless trade group CTIA’s lobbyist Brian Josef.
WEA is an outgrowth of EAS, which radio and television stations and cable systems partake in. WEA, too, includes a way for the public to receive a message from the President during a national emergency. In the WEA system, the Presidential alert cannot be disabled on a consumer’s smartphone, according to WAMC.org.
Typically WEA messages are short and send the public to their local TV and radio stations for more information. They’re restricted to 90 characters, Inside Towers has reported. That could change as the FCC is slated to vote Thursday on a Notice of Public Rulemaking to, among other things, allow more characters and multimedia in WEA messages.
This is a big week for alerting. The WEA action comes as the second national EAS test is slated for Wednesday, September 28. That would be postponed to October 5, if there’s an emergency that would make the test too distracting.
A FEMA spokesman tells Inside Towers that WEA will not be part of the nationwide EAS test.
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