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Emergency Alert System
The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Emergency Alert System (EAS) Notice of Inquiry (NOI) proposed rule changes that included a call for requiring broadcasters and cable operators to carry local and state emergency warnings. This provision is commonly referred to as “Governor Must Carry” (GMC). Currently, the only mandatory EAS messages in the FCC’s rules are those issued by the President.[1]
One reason GMC was put into that NOI was because of complaints that governors were not using the EAS to tell traffic fleeing from events like Hurricane Ike that all highways were converted to head north. Another reason: In Texas, instead of using EAS for the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, the governor convened a news conference where reporters asked if AMBER (Child Abduction) alerts could be used to warn people about touching pieces of the fallen shuttle. Other instances of failures to originate proper warnings, or misuse of proper warning protocols are in the record.
AWARE Forum has forged a new partnership with the Broadcast Warning Working Group (BWWG) and its blog, The EAS Forum. Below is the first of regular posts you will begin seeing on AWARE from alert and warning expert and EAS Forum author Richard Rudman. We are pleased to be sharing Richard’s content with you, and if you like what you see be sure to check out The EAS Forum for more.
In the Emergency Alert System (EAS) Notice of Inquiry (NOI) regarding proposed rule changes for EAS was the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) proposal for a so-called “Governor Must Carry” provision. This proposal was developed because of complaints that governors were not using EAS to tell traffic fleeing from events like Hurricane Ike that all highways were converted to head north. In Texas, instead of using EAS for the shuttle disaster, the governor convened a news conference. Other instances of failures to originate proper warnings are in the record.
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This post is the last in a 5-part series of reports on the contents of the FCC Fifth Report and Order released on January 10, 2012, which amends the Emergency Alert System (EAS) rules to accommodate Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) messages.
Stop by the EAS Category on the AWARE Forum for previous posts in this series on the new CAP EAS rules introduced in the Report and Order (R&O). In this final look at the R&O, we will detail the various items that FCC declined to make a decision on at this point. In addition, the Commission made several interesting statements regarding their apparent view on legacy EAS going forward. [xxx] below denotes the R&O paragraph which discusses the noted language. Also below, the use of the word “SAME” means Specific Area Message Encoding, the technical name for the legacy EAS protocol originally coined by the National Weather Service.
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Earlier this month, I attended the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. This event receives a significant amount of attention from both technology and mainstream news sources, so a recap of the new TVs (which were amazing), Ultrabooks (I want one), and other gizmos (do we need a six-foot-tall iPod dock?) isn’t really useful. However there is one theme I want to key in on. I didn’t quite see it while I was walking the exhibit floor, but realized it after discussing the event with colleagues.
Broadcast is dead.
This post is Part 4 of 5 in a series of reports on the contents of the FCC Fifth Report and Order released on January 10, 2012, which amends the Emergency Alert System (EAS) rules to accommodate Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) messages.
For previous posts in this 5-part series on the new CAP EAS rules introduced in the Report and Order (R&O), check out the EAS Category on the AWARE Forum. In this edition of our series we will address rules of interest to State Emergency Communications Committees (SECCs). [xxx] below denotes the R&O paragraph which discusses the noted language. Also below, the use of the word “SAME” means Specific Area Message Encoding, the technical name for the legacy EAS protocol originally coined by the National Weather Service.
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