Emergency Broadcasts

EAS Broadcasts are easy to avoid, just don't have the telly on, surely? Not like they turn themselves on and start that horrible ear piercing tone.

Tornadoes, unfortunately, are anti-social and may rip through your house at three in the morning.

It's not just TV, there are mobile alerts too which are full volume. So chances are you won't be able to avoid it.

The test ones don't send mobile alerts though, do they?

That and it was an expensive luxury that they couldn't really justify.

The transmitter at Alexandra Palace was switched on during the war though:
http://tx.mb21.co.uk/gallery/alexandrapalace/war.php

It's not even a factor these days, as you say there's so many radio transmissions and why would a guided missile need to use a broadcast to navigate anyway?

I'd imagine that if the need arises some sort of message from the government could/would be broadcast on the major channels, but I doubt that it's an 'automatic' thing. These days it would just be case of it being put out as part of rolling news about the situation.

I never have received a mobile EAS test.

If your iPhone is locked and set to silent the tone will ring and the message will stay at the top of your push notifications and if your using it you will get a pop up. Here's a link to my Instagram'showing what it looks like when your phones locked.

The mobile push alerts are pretty neat when you think about how they are delivered. Amber Alerts, NWS Warnings and other messages are sent across the nation via the PBS satellite distribution system and all alerts as a data stream on your local PBS stations DTV signal. The cellular sites receive the DTV signals and if the towers are within the alert polygon they will trigger the alert on your phone. I believe they use PBS stations because they cover most of the nation - more so than the broadcast networks. I believe cell sites not within a PBS regions contour receive data via satellite or other means.


Some cable boxes do turn on during an EAS alert or test - but shouldn't be a problem if the TV is turned off. During an EAS Test or alert cable boxes and TiVo's in my area lock up so you can't change the channel. Any recorded programs or OnDemand programs you might be viewing will stop and the device will tune to a designated channel (in my area it's the local school district).

Edit : I should have said that the PBS distribution of the alert signals are used as a back up. The primary path is through the phone company sending it to the towers, if the phone company link fails they'll still be able to send the alert.

In today's world there isn't really a need for emergency broadcasts in the scary way some expect and want them to be. Here in the UK, we'd just have a news report for anything major happening or about to happen. The days when the government would need to take control and use just BBC to issue statements are long gone in my opinion.

You would still need people in the background to run and to ensure the report continues to run without fault. Further to that, the government would need to trust that each broadcaster would report in a timely manner. I would say, there's still very much a need for an EBS.

Dave will have a little sting at the bottom which says "PLEASE TURN TO A NEWS CHANNEL FOR AN URGENT ANNOUNCEMENT", in the middle of the 2882184th repeat of Top Gear.

There are some people around here who thinks that happens as a matter of routine today.

It would be "cool", but I don't see a need.

Related to the above, here's an EBS alert (the predecessor to EAS, but buggered if I know what the difference is) unravelling on a radio station in Indiana in 1971, where the poor presenter is left as clueless as his listeners only to discover the alert was triggered by accident. I feel sorry for anybody who was listening at the time. I suppose the closest we ever got to this sort of empty panic was when BBC Two came off air too early to announce the death of the Queen Mother, and left viewers with a silent slide for about four minutes.