[EAS] Sufolk Co, NY EAS mishap

[Ed Czarnecki]

The county intended to send a voluntary evacuation notice to people located
on Fire Island.  Unfortunately, the chose to send this notice with the EVI
event code, via WEA and EAS, apparently not fully understanding what the
short WEA message and standard EAS header would look like.  The full CAP
text was long, as follows (with header, via DASDEC):

"A CIVIL AUTHORITY HAS ISSUED AN IMMEDIATE EVACUATION NOTICE FOR THE
FOLLOWING COUNTIES/AREAS: Suffolk, NY; AT 7:10 PM ON SEP 3, 2016 EFFECTIVE
UNTIL 6:10 AM SEP 4, 2016. MESSAGE FROM IPAWSCAP. This is an emergency
message from Suffolk County Office of Emergency Management. Suffolk County
has declared a state of emergency in anticipation of the arrival of Tropical
Storm Hermine. Due to the forecast of potentially life-threatening storm
surge on Fire Island and other storm conditions we are asking all those on
Fire Island to begin a voluntary evacuation beginning immediately. Full
medical services have been removed from Fire Island and we are concerned for
those with medical conditions. Ferry Service to and from the island may be
suspended as early as tomorrow at 1pm due to severe weather so you are urged
to make arrangements to leave Fire Island prior to that time."

I have not seen a screenshot of a WEA alert yet.

Compounding the error was misinformation issued by Suffolk County Executive
Steve Bellone, to the effect that it was FEMA that ordered an evacuation,
and the alerts were their fault - which was 100% incorrect on both counts -
it was his own folks, partly in response to the state of emergency declared
by Bellone himself.  Oops.  Bellone may have been confused that his folks
used their software to issue an alert via IPAWS OPEN, but FEMA was merely
the transit point for the message.

-----Original Message-----
From: eas-bounces at radiolists.net [mailto:eas-bounces at radiolists.net] On
Behalf Of Mike McCarthy

Anyone have more information on the hiccup EVI message with truncated audio
and text issued by Suffolk Co. NY to evacuate Fire Island prior the arrival
of Hermine?

Problem is, as I understand, the part which specified only Fire Island never