[EAS] Fwd: [ChicagolandSkywarn] WEA Enabled Phones to Receive Emergency Messages

[Mike McCarthy]

I'll concur with Ed on the capacity and addressing issue.  It won't take 
a lot of bandwidth at each site for a mass blast.  Think of it as a 
broadcast to all handsets on that cellsite or MTSO. Much like the EAS 
preamble for an EAN, the phones in totality would receive a display-all 
code message header and a one shot UDP type text blast. 1-5KB and that's 
it. All phones alerted before the real traffic of the event starts.

I will say again that even after the IPAWS filtering, I can see agencies 
sending high priority messages, including AMBER alerts, which in 
totality will drive the public to a mode of 
passivity/yawn/ho-hum/doesn't impact me mindset. Particularly items 
which have no relevance to a given geo-area, such as an AMBER situation 
originated from the other end of the state.  This is an inherent problem 
with the political boundaries present and how they're incorporated into 
emergency messaging. Emergencies are more often than not intensely local.

Society has largely grown past what are now merely lines drawn on a map 
covering many disparate locations. And what has relevance in one area 
has zero in another.  But because things operate under unified state 
systems, the item must be carried all over.  Which if IPAWS doesn't 
filter by geography tighter than a whole state for state wide messages 
will be a major contributor to it's ultimate failure.

MM

On 5/16/2012 9:04 AM, Ed Czarnecki wrote:
> CMAS/WEA is on a separate channel from voice and data.  Also, it is cell broadcast (multicast) to enabled handsets.
>
> Only a certain class of alerts are eligible to make it from the IPAWS aggregator through the wireless carrier gateways - i.e. those EAS events representing imminent threat to life and property.  Further the alerts must be originated by accredited emergency management authorities in the CAP data format, tag with the highest levels of urgency, severity and certainty (CAP message elements).
>
> So the intent is for the alerts to be geo targeted, high priority, and not susceptible to network traffic.
>
> Edward Czarnecki, PhD
> Senior Director - Strategy,  Development&  Regulatory Affairs
> Monroe Electronics / Digital Alert Systems
>
> -----Original message-----
>> From:Tom Taggart<tpt at literock93r.com>
>> I'll still loose AT&T service in downtown Columbus just
>> because everyone is on their I-Phone at the same time.