SFReady.org
Founded in 1998, SF READY provides valuable and timely information and resources regarding emergency management and business continuity to the San Francisco business community.
SFReady.org
Founded in 1998, SF READY provides valuable and timely information and resources regarding emergency management and business continuity to the San Francisco business community.
At 12 o’clock every Tuesday afternoon the City tests the outdoor warning system for San Francisco. The system consists of 56 air raid sirens, which are activated all at once by the Mayor’s Office of Emergency Services. If you hear these warning sirens continuously at any other time, tune to KCBS 740 AM or KQED 88.5 FM on your radio for emergency information broadcasts.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Weather Alert system consists of about 700 VHF radio transmitters (each broadcasting on one of seven frequencies) that were originally designed to provide alerts about floods, thunderstorms, tornadoes, and other natural disasters.
Using SAME codes, modern Weather Alert radio receivers can sound the alarm only for alerts that affect one or several counties that you have specified. Event codes can also signal what kind of alert is being broadcast—including AMBER and terrorism alerts.
For life-threatening emergencies, a special 1050 Hz “alert” tone is broadcast, to indicate the threat is more severe than the standard weather alerts.
The follow-on to the old Emergency Broadcast System, The EAS system is activated in times of local or national emergencies. This is the system that begins and ends with that loud screech that sounds somewhat like a computer modem trying to connect. These alerts can be relayed automatically, though larger stations will generally have a human operator create a news ticker (for TV stations) or read an announcement live on the air (TV and radio).
EDIS (Emergency Digital Information Systems) is a California-created supplement to the Emergency Alert System. It is primarially designed for communicating alerts to the media and public agencies, rather than the public-at-large. EDIS alerts are available on-line via the California OES's Website. Some businesses and individuals, though, may be interested in setting up their own VHF radio receivers hooked up to computers and printers to monitor the alerts directly.