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Radio News: FCC adds wind and storm surge warnings to Emergency Alert System

Jul 11, 2016 11:29 pm
Click here to play or download an audio version of this report.

Matthew Lasar reports at Radio Survivor that while there are global warming skeptics in Washington D.C., the Federal Communications Commission has authorized three new Emergency Alert System event codes that seem to confirm more powerful storms: “Extreme Wind Warning” (EWW), “Storm Surge Watch” (SWW), and “Storm Surge Warning” (SSW). FCC Chair Tom Wheeler wrote on his blog earlier this month that the current system with radio and television stations interrupting programming to alert viewers and listeners about weather warnings is a “proven life-saver, but it could be better.” The FCC spoke with the heads of Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Hurricane Center about what the most dangerous weather events are, and found they had no warnings for storm surge or high winds. Lasar explains that the Emergency Alert System includes a digital header code, then that grating two-tone attention signal, "then the automatic audio message, triggered by a specific event code, and then an End of Message code. The header code contains the event code, which classifies the emergency."
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