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Emergency Broadcast: Difference between revisions
→Emergency Broadcast systems by country: sorted alphabetically by country, updated the entry for Canada
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== Emergency Broadcast systems by country ==
'''Australia:''' [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM4gPCLzLO8 The Standard Emergency Warning Signal], used primarily in Queensland to warn of cyclones, but now possibly being expanded for bushfires and terror threats in the rest of the country. Possibly, along with Japan's EWS and Alberta's EPWS, one of the few Emergency Broadcast systems to originally be developed specifically for a weather/geological hazard rather than [[Atomic Hate]].▼
'''[[Eagle Land|USA]]:''' The first US Emergency Broadcast system was [[wikipedia:CONELRAD|CONELRAD]] (CONtrol of ELectronic RADiation), intended only to warn listeners/viewers of an impending atomic attack and to make it hard for Soviet bombers to find American cities by using radio direction finding. It was eventually renamed the [[wikipedia:Emergency Broadcast System|Emergency Broadcast System]] when advances in communication and weather radar made it possible for state and local authorities to use it to disseminate information about local emergencies. Later, as alerts began to be disseminated through non-broadcast routes (cable and satellite TV, cellphones, weather radios), the system was again renamed, this time as the [[wikipedia:Emergency Alert System|Emergency Alert System]], or EAS.▼
'''Austria:''' Austria has several kinds of alarm sirens that are broadcasted mostly from the firefighter stations.▼
All TV and radio stations are required to test their EAS systems at least once a month, with weekly tests required for feeder stations. Of course these tests usually warn that there's no actual emergency going on first. This has resulted in the phrase "This is a test. This is only a test" and the old two-tone EBS attention beep [[Memetic Mutation|becoming a part of popular culture]]. The new EAS alerts may or may not include a two-tone attention beep but always include an encoded ASCII string, repeated three times, which sounds like an old-school modem and is called a "chirp" or "duck farts" in the business. The string contains specific information as to the type of alert (or test) and the location of the emergency. Some modern weather radios can be programmed to only activate the alarm for alerts that apply to where the radio's installed and only for hazards that would actually be of concern to the area. In some areas the EAS test is unannounced and contains only the three ASCII chirps.▼
* Warning: 3 minutes steady▼
* Alarm: 1 minute wailing▼
* All-clear: 1 minute steady▼
All sirens are tested on one Saturday in the year instead of the noon test.▼
'''[[Canada]]:''' [https://www.alertready.ca/ Alert Ready] is a national alert system with the capability to override radio broadcasts and use "Wireless Public Alerting" to push alert messages to 4G LTE cellphones. Unlike the similar system in the USA, Canadians cannot opt out of WPA messages (but WPA messages are not billable, either). Alerts are sent in specific geographic areas for wildfires, natural disasters, Amber Alerts, terrorist threats, and other emergencies. Environment Canada's "Weatheradio Canada" (which disseminated weather warnings, alerts, and tests on VHF radio) has been incorporated into Alert Ready.
The EAS is usually activated locally for tests and missing children/Amber Alerts. Tornado and severe thunderstorm/ [[Kill It with Water|flash flood]] warnings are also common reasons for activations, occasionally leading to a [[Emergency Broadcast/Awesome|Crowning Moment of Awesome]]. Less commonly, [[Kill It with Fire|fires]], [[Giant Wall of Watery Doom|tsunamis]], chemical spills or other local disasters can result in an activation. State and especially national activations are usually reserved for [[Atomic Hate|nuclear]] [[Nuke'Em|attack]] or any other [[Apocalypse How|apocalyptic-level]] threat. Many times these alerts then redirect to an area's local NOAA Weather Radio station, where an automated voice reports the event's details.▼
In a local government investigation following the October 2003 Southern California wildfires, the fact that the San Diego area Emergency Alert System was ''never'' activated became a central issue. (It turned out that every local official who had the authority to do so was unaware of their own authority, except for the representative of the National Weather Service, who deemed the situation outside of his responsibility since it was not strictly a weather event.) ▼
'''Czech Republic:''' Alarm sirens are tested the first Wednesday each month, at noon. They are accompanied by voice messages announcing that it's just a test, but especially if you are in a building the only thing you hear is the sirens' wailing.▼
A national EAS test was performed on November 11, 2011. It showed that nationally, the system needed a little work: Some cable providers switched to their EAS feed station (usually QVC or another [[Home Shopping]] channel) without showing the test, others didn't state that a test was happening, and Direct TV viewers were hearing [[Lady Gaga]] instead of the test message.▼
'''Japan:''' [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_8ZkBXVvMw The Emergency Warning System] is used primarily as a very short-fuse warning on earthquakes (e.g. 10 seconds or so between warning and quake at best) and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTBzHak-4mY to warn for imminent evacuation due to tsunamis]. The tone will almost immediately be followed up with a broadcast from the NHK in both Japanese and English audio or subtitles. The more bells/more urgent the tone, the more urgent or severe the threat is, and its use is reserved for imminent danger and national tragedies (for example, the tone that was used to indicate the start of WWII has yet to be used again).▼
▲'''Canada:''' Only one province, Alberta, has an emergency warning system. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yieKSxczXXY The Alberta Emergency Public Warning System] was planned after an F5 tornado tore through Edmonton, but was only picked up by all broadcasters after a F3 tornado destroyed a campground at Pine Lake. The EPWS serves to advise the public of imminent threats such as severe summer weather (tornadoes, thunderstorms, and floods) and civil emergencies, and also broadcasts AMBER Alerts. It generally is not used to disseminate less emergent weather alerts such as snowfall or blizzard warnings, as those are considered relatively common events during most of the winter (and spring, and...).
Also, the Japanese test signal is not entirely standardized across broadcasting stations (even stations within a given city like will differ; examples abound on [[YouTube]]) except for the emergency chime, a video/audio description of when a real broadcast would be activated, an emergency tone, and a notification in Japanese that the audible "piro-piro-piro" tone (the data burst, not the bells mentioned above) is only audible on analog TVs, with an additional device required after the digital transition due to it being a data signal to digital TVs.▼
'''Russia:''' An old system of power-independent wire radio ("radiotochka") still exists for this exact purpose, for performing emergency broadcasts even during blackouts.▼
'''United Kingdom:''' [[wikipedia:Four minute warning|The Four-Minute Warning]], an emergency broadcast ''only'' to be used in the case of [[Atomic Hate]]. (This system was dismantled in 1992). Weather warnings and other emergency messages are done through news special reports.▼
'''South Korea:''' Around the fifteenth of every month (usually) at 2pm, civil defense drills are conducted. Sirens go off and all road activity is stopped for fifteen minutes. Pedestrians are encouraged to get off the pavement and take shelter. Radio stations (but not TV) interrupt their broadcasts with the sirens at 2pm and tell people where to go and what to do in case of emergency (usually assumed to be an attack from North Korea). At 2:15pm an all clear siren sounds and normal activity resumes.▼
▲'''Japan:''' [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_8ZkBXVvMw The Emergency Warning System] is used primarily as a very short-fuse warning on earthquakes (e.g. 10 seconds or so between warning and quake at best) and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTBzHak-4mY to warn for imminent evacuation due to tsunamis]. The tone will almost immediately be followed up with a broadcast from the NHK in both Japanese and English audio or subtitles. The more bells/more urgent the tone, the more urgent or severe the threat is, and its use is reserved for imminent danger and national tragedies (for example, the tone that was used to indicate the start of WWII has yet to be used again).
▲'''United Kingdom:''' [[wikipedia:Four minute warning|The Four-Minute Warning]], an emergency broadcast ''only'' to be used in the case of [[Atomic Hate]]. (This system was dismantled in 1992). Weather warnings and other emergency messages are done through news special reports.
▲Also, the Japanese test signal is not entirely standardized across broadcasting stations (even stations within a given city like will differ; examples abound on [[YouTube]]) except for the emergency chime, a video/audio description of when a real broadcast would be activated, an emergency tone, and a notification in Japanese that the audible "piro-piro-piro" tone (the data burst, not the bells mentioned above) is only audible on analog TVs, with an additional device required after the digital transition due to it being a data signal to digital TVs.
▲'''[[Eagle Land|USA]]:''' The first US Emergency Broadcast system was [[wikipedia:CONELRAD|CONELRAD]] (CONtrol of ELectronic RADiation), intended only to warn listeners/viewers of an impending atomic attack and to make it hard for Soviet bombers to find American cities by using radio direction finding. It was eventually renamed the [[wikipedia:Emergency Broadcast System|Emergency Broadcast System]] when advances in communication and weather radar made it possible for state and local authorities to use it to disseminate information about local emergencies. Later, as alerts began to be disseminated through non-broadcast routes (cable and satellite TV, cellphones, weather radios), the system was again renamed, this time as the [[wikipedia:Emergency Alert System|Emergency Alert System]], or EAS.
▲'''Australia:''' [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM4gPCLzLO8 The Standard Emergency Warning Signal], used primarily in Queensland to warn of cyclones, but now possibly being expanded for bushfires and terror threats in the rest of the country. Possibly, along with Japan's EWS and Alberta's EPWS, one of the few Emergency Broadcast systems to originally be developed specifically for a weather/geological hazard rather than [[Atomic Hate]].
▲All TV and radio stations are required to test their EAS systems at least once a month, with weekly tests required for feeder stations. Of course these tests usually warn that there's no actual emergency going on first. This has resulted in the phrase "This is a test. This is only a test" and the old two-tone EBS attention beep [[Memetic Mutation|becoming a part of popular culture]]. The new EAS alerts may or may not include a two-tone attention beep but always include an encoded ASCII string, repeated three times, which sounds like an old-school modem and is called a "chirp" or "duck farts" in the business. The string contains specific information as to the type of alert (or test) and the location of the emergency. Some modern weather radios can be programmed to only activate the alarm for alerts that apply to where the radio's installed and only for hazards that would actually be of concern to the area. In some areas the EAS test is unannounced and contains only the three ASCII chirps.
▲'''Czech Republic:''' Alarm sirens are tested the first Wednesday each month, at noon. They are accompanied by voice messages announcing that it's just a test, but especially if you are in a building the only thing you hear is the sirens' wailing.
▲The EAS is usually activated locally for tests and missing children/Amber Alerts. Tornado and severe thunderstorm/ [[Kill It with Water|flash flood]] warnings are also common reasons for activations, occasionally leading to a [[Emergency Broadcast/Awesome|Crowning Moment of Awesome]]. Less commonly, [[Kill It with Fire|fires]], [[Giant Wall of Watery Doom|tsunamis]], chemical spills or other local disasters can result in an activation. State and especially national activations are usually reserved for [[Atomic Hate|nuclear]] [[Nuke'Em|attack]] or any other [[Apocalypse How|apocalyptic-level]] threat. Many times these alerts then redirect to an area's local NOAA Weather Radio station, where an automated voice reports the event's details.
▲'''Austria:''' Austria has several kinds of alarm sirens that are broadcasted mostly from the firefighter stations.
▲Siren test (every Saturday at noon): 1x 15 seconds steady
▲Fire alarm: 3x 15 seconds steady
▲Warning: 3 minutes steady
▲Alarm: 1 minute wailing
▲All-clear: 1 minute steady
▲All sirens are tested on one Saturday in the year instead of the noon test.
▲In a local government investigation following the October 2003 Southern California wildfires, the fact that the San Diego area Emergency Alert System was ''never'' activated became a central issue. (It turned out that every local official who had the authority to do so was unaware of their own authority, except for the representative of the National Weather Service, who deemed the situation outside of his responsibility since it was not strictly a weather event.)
▲'''South Korea:''' Around the fifteenth of every month (usually) at 2pm, civil defense drills are conducted. Sirens go off and all road activity is stopped for fifteen minutes. Pedestrians are encouraged to get off the pavement and take shelter. Radio stations (but not TV) interrupt their broadcasts with the sirens at 2pm and tell people where to go and what to do in case of emergency (usually assumed to be an attack from North Korea). At 2:15pm an all clear siren sounds and normal activity resumes.
▲A national EAS test was performed on November 11, 2011. It showed that nationally, the system needed a little work: Some cable providers switched to their EAS feed station (usually QVC or another [[Home Shopping]] channel) without showing the test, others didn't state that a test was happening, and Direct TV viewers were hearing [[Lady Gaga]] instead of the test message.
▲'''Russia:''' An old system of power-independent wire radio ("radiotochka") still exists for this exact purpose, for performing emergency broadcasts even during blackouts.
== Comic Books ==
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