[EAS] Fire

[Gregory Muir]

Had a grass fire this past July that spread very fast due to high winds and was heading directly towards town.  It consumed several thousand acres and was very difficult to contain due to the winds.
 
As usual, there were no EAS alerts but the local agencies did employ a reverse 911 phone call to order an evacuation of the potentially affected area of town.  But it was unfortunate that the person entering the instructions used abbreviations for the bordering streets (i.e., N.W instead of Northwest, etc.) so the synthesized voice software ended up pronouncing only gibberish.  The same was for a subsequent evacuation alert as well.  I emailed the local disaster services coordinator and later a real (protein-based) voice accompanied the next call.
 
EAS, reverse 911, warning sirens - all need to somehow be "glued" together along with the proper training to make for a comprehensive warning system but it often seems like each responsible agency still has that NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) mindset at times.
 
Greg Muir
Wolfram Engineering, Inc.
Great Falls, MT