Communicating Hazards with Wireless Emergency Alerts

Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) is a partnership between government, industry, non-profit organizations and academia. Moreover, WEA has become an essential part of emergency preparedness in the United States- used nearly 40,000 times since 2012 to deliver geographically targeted emergency alert messages to millions of cell phones and credited by the news media, emergency responders, and the general public with saving numerous lives. Significant enhancements to WEA are scheduled to roll out in 2019, including improvements to geographical targeting and increased message length. However, there is significant discussion about actual timelines for rollout and the capability of existing cell phones to benefit from the enhancements. Attendees of this session will learn about the enhancements, what NOAA's National Weather Service (NWS) is doing to leverage the enhancements, and get the latest information on timelines for rollout.