[EAS] CMAS

[Lowell Kiesow]

The wireless carriers don't want people doing that because the amount 
of simultaneous traffic can overload their network.  As we learned 
the hard way during tsunami alerts, the NWS doesn't have enough web 
server capacity either.  We saw the same thing here during the Amber 
alert via CMAS last week.  The Amber web portals were useless for 
some time after the alert went out.  CMAS, at least right now, is so 
effective at generating interest that the consequences of system 
overloads are very real.  Hence the wording "check local media" was 
very deliberate to try and avoid these problems.  Maybe revising the 
phrase to "check local radio & TV" might be more effective.

However, there needs to be a better mechanism to get detailed  info 
to broadcasters without congestion.  During the Amber, our news staff 
had trouble getting information for broadcast.  They finally got it 
from Total Traffic, who likely got it from the WA State Department of 
Transportation.  Because of the problems described above, there was 
no other source, and we didn't get an EAS until 20 to 30 minutes later.

At 07:28 PM 1/14/2013, you wrote:
>Hi Bob,
>
>For weather related alerts, how about an embedded hot link in the CMAS
>message pointing towards the local WFO for that county?
>MM
>

         Lowell Kiesow, Senior Engineer
         KPLU 88.5, KVIX, KPLI, KPLK
         www.kplu.org www.jazz24.org