[EAS] Manual Relay and Immediacy

[Mike McCarthy]

Al and all,

I don't take EAS and it's necessary tests as silly. Quite the contrary.

The point I was making is we have been burned before (twice) by compulsory
carry messages gone awry. One errant state EOC issued EAN test message
went 10 minutes without an EAT and ultimately carrying the LP-1's
programming for upwards of 9 minutes before the local LP-1 issued the EAT
(not EOM) on it's own. By that time we had pulled the plug on everything
EAS and forcibly bypassed all points of insertion. The causes were
irrelevant as the damage in system credibility was done in management's
eyes.

A 2nd incident..which as I recall did have an EAT, also didn't help
either. Neither are/were silly and the repercussions were swift and
appropriate under the circumstances. And in our case, costly as we needed
to install additional new equipment and make some significant changes in
our program chain to prevent recurrence.

After those two events, most of metro Chicago installed failsafe bypass
facilities wrapping MSRP's. And I can't imagine most of the major groups
not having similar kill/bypass failsafe options in place as well to avoid
a similar errant (or hyjacked) capture in their various markets. Never
mind one button EOM/EAT programmed at LP-1's and LP'2 should that occur.

The errors which have taken place here in Illinois created some not so
silly environments which those of us charged with implementing the systems
must consider program recovery under any condition. While the default mode
of operation is as prescribed in the rules and we will forward anything
we're required automatically, anything abnormal for us simply
participating stations gets the plug pulled first (questions asked later)
so we can quickly assure the public that Armageddon isn't on the horizon.
Never mind maintaining control of our program paths. Nope...not silly in
the least.

Rant mode off....

Cheers...

MM

On Sat, August 20, 2016 8:59 am, Al Kenyon wrote:
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Okay, an earlier thread was getting pretty silly. Is there really a concern
with an NPT message causing an EAS device to hang or freeze up in a
forwarding state?