[HSMM-COS] Fwd: Key emergency notification system, NOAA's "All Hazards Radio" DOWN

[Bill Bishop]

FYI:


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	Key emergency notification system, NOAA's "All Hazards Radio"
DOWN
Date: 	Tue, 27 Aug 2013 19:22:57 GMT
From: 	<Danny Burstein>



Key emergency notification system, NOAA's "All Hazards Radio" DOWN

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has operated a
nationwide network of radio transmitters providing full time weather reports
and forecasts for decades now, dating back to their "Weather Bureau" days.

As I wrote in my note to RISKS back in Oct 2005 [a], where I discussed the
lack of backup power to many of their facilities:

  "These stations are part of the _real_ emergency network and are supposed
  to stay up after anything short of a direct nuclear hit."

There are numerous radio receivers that can pick up these stations, with
many of them in a "silent/squelch mode" until activated.

In case of a local hazardous/emergency situation such as a hurricane,
tornado, flood, chemical spill, nuclear reactor plant breach, or.. national
events up to and including nuclear attack, the transmitters send out an
alert tone which "unlocks" the receivers and activates the loudspeakers.

Hence just about every "911 PSAP" (public safety answering position),
utility headquarters, transit operations center, many tv/radio stations,
and... thousands and thousands of people living in tornado/hurricane/flood
zones, have these radios. Hence it's critical that the system stay up.

Recently friends of mine in NYC noted that the local station, covering
perhaps 15 million people, was repeatedly off the air for the past two
months.

Finally, after many complaints to NOAA, they posted a note on their
"outages" web page confirming the problem. And then, a few days later, came
up with the startling reason that...

(quoting from the page [b]):

  SPECIAL NOTICE
  NEW YORK CITY, NY Transmitter (KWO35)
  Frequency 162.550

  Due to interference issues with the U.S. Coast Guard, the New York City
  transmitter has been temporarily taken out of service while a solution is
  being formulated.

Yes. Really.

The Big Problem here (aside from the lack of urgency by all the folk
involved) is that many, make that MANY, people and agencies are counting on
this working. Folk using the radios in "squelch" (silent) mode are relying
on them to "open up" in an emergency, yet have no way to know the system is
dead.

It's kind of like relying on your overhead sprinklers and not knowing that
the main water valve is off.

[a] http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/24.07.html#subj4

[b] http://www.nws.noaa.gov/nwr/outages.php

- since the NOAA outage page is dynamic and, hopefully, real soon now, will
  change when the system is finally fixed, I've mirrored that image up at:

    http://www.dburstein.com/images/noaa-tx.png