When you are out or about, or in class, or at home, mostly everyone who has their cell phone on will be getting alerts from the Federal Government on Wednesday, October 3rd. There will be two alerts you will get. The first alert will come at 1:18 pm Central and it will be a Wireless Emergency Alert. The text of the WEA message will have a header that reads “Presidential Alert” and text that reads:
“THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.”
Then two minutes later at 1:20 pm Central, you will get a Emergency Alert System message. The message will read:
“THIS IS A TEST of the National Emergency Alert System. This system was developed by broadcast and cable operators in voluntary cooperation with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Federal Communications Commission, and local authorities to keep you informed in the event of an emergency. If this had been an actual emergency an official message would have followed the tone alert you heard at the start of this message. A similar wireless emergency alert test message has been sent to all cell phones nationwide. Some cell phones will receive the message; others will not. No action is required.”
The test will assess the operational readiness of the infrastructure for distribution of a national message and determine whether improvements are needed. EAS allows the President to address the nation through radio and television stations, cable systems, satellite radio and television providers. And cell towers will broadcast the WEA test message as a “Presidential Alert” for approximately 30 minutes, although phones should only receive the message once.
The test was supposed to happen on Thursday, September 20, but Hurricane Florence recovery efforts postponed this test. And if you have a cell phone, you will most likely get these messages, there is no opting out. Learn more about this at: https://www.fema.gov/emergency-alert-test
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