[EAS] National Weather Service Message Flooding - A report from the Inland Empire of CA

[Richard Rudman]

Greetings:

I wanted to tell you that one of the LECC's within California set up a conference call today on the NWS "message flooding" issue. I have to commend the San Bernardino County Government for recognizing the severity of the problem and calling the parties together. Their input and interest in this LECC puts them right at the top of my "California Best LECC" list.

According to my rough notes we had representatives on the call from four different weather service offices, two representatives from NWS headquarters in Maryland, and a representative from an FCC Field Office -- along with LECC representatives, a representative of the California SECC (me), and Adrienne Abbott (well-known on this list) from Las Vegas, and the California Office of Emergency Management.

There was across the board agreement that there is indeed a serious problem with NWS "message flooding" in the Inland Empire region. The nature of severe storm tracks means that that there are going to be a lot of NWS EAS activations during some seasons. The NWS Weather Services radio for the region is fed by multiple offices, making likely an overlap of warnings issued. Messages sometimes go longer than the two-minute timeout set in all the EAS boxes.

We set a goal of two weeks from today to compile a report on actions that have been taken and will be taken to try to mitigate the major concerns.

I am hoping to report some best practices out of this effort back to this list at that time. This is a nationwide problem and it is reassuring to know that we have some dedicated people besides "EAS Participants" who are trying to do something about it.

I strongly suggest that other areas experiencing "message flooding" get together with your local emergency managers and call similar meetings -- in person or conference call -- to look for solutions. Please feel free to report progress or problems on this issue back to this list.

Regards,

Richard Rudman
Core Member, the BWWG
Vice Chair, CA SECC