[EAS] Cancelling Amber alerts

[Mike McCarthy]

Let's not confuse things.

There are really two sets of message types within the 53 defined in Part 11:

1) NWS/NOAA/FEMA/DOE defined events and those related to true natual
occurances (EAN/EAT, NPT, Earthquake, Volcano, etc.)

2) Civil Authority orignated.

The 33 or so event codes in #1 have an association to an official text
product issued by an a US government agency. Such as NOAA, DOE, and
others. About half are actually toned out on NOAA NWR TX's as real call to
action messages. Particularly those related to immediate life safety.

The Civil Codes (CEM, TOE, et al) OTOH are less clear in their scenario
applicability. But they are intended to be locally
(read---state/county/municipal) orignated and not by the feds.

My prior comment not withstanding about originating event end messages
with a live code, there are several which would appear to have
applicability.  Two which jump out are the ADM or NMN.

My take on those definitions are the FCC and FEMA were puposely vague in
their framing so as to allow local agencies the ability to write their own
plans and apply them as their local conditions permit or demand. Some are
clear while others are a bit anbigious.

Take the TOE 911 outage for example. In A major metro, it would not be
used until a good portion of the metro's CO's have lost service. In a
small town, it's an all or nothing proposition given most are served by a
single CO.

To Maryanne's thought on litigation, part of proving ones case for damages
is whether an act by an official performing their public duty was
intentionally harmful and/or unreasonable on it's face. Anyone can sue of
course and it's a pain to defend through what would be an obvious
dismissal at the first hearing.

Never the less, public officials need to understand how to use this now 18
year old tool.

MM

On Fri, October 16, 2015 6:24 pm, Phil Johnson wrote:
> Adrienne,
>
> To my knowledge, these are the only Event Code definitions we have, and I
>  believe they've been in use for at least a decade.  If you have a better
>  set, please let us know.  Or let's discuss proposals for change.
> Otherwise,