On March 18 hundreds of South Austin residents received a Wireless Emergency Alert produced by Travis County, informing residents in the neighborhood of Travis Country to stay indoors as police investigated a tripwire bomb. While still in its early stages of implementation, the Wireless Emergency Alert system helps officials deliver information to people in a designated area during an emergency. The Austin Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, which coordinates emergency information and alerts with other Austin and Travis County officials, encourages residents to sign up for emergency alerts for their neighborhoods to make sure they stay informed if and when another incident comes about. “Warning people is a partnership,” Austin HSEM Deputy Director Scott Swearengin said. “We work very hard to get the information that the citizens need to receive. We need them to then subscribe to the systems so they can receive those critical warnings in a timely manner.”

Automatic Wireless Emergency Alerts

Swearengin said Wireless Emergency Alerts, which are non-subscription-based messages sent to cellphones through the cell service provider, are one of the newer warning tools available to local entities. Wireless Emergency Alerts in Texas are sent by county, state or federal agencies using the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, or IPAWS, he said. Through the system, created and regulated by the Federal Communications Commission, an entity can create a 90-character warning message and draw a specific location on a map where they would like to target cellphones to receive the message. Automatic push notifications sent by the state about Amber Alerts or alerts sent by the National Weather Service are some of the most commonly sent Wireless Emergency Alerts, he said. Because the Austin Office of Homeland Security is aware of possible “warning fatigue,” they work with Travis County to only send alerts when a situation would require residents to take action or stay aware of the situation in order to be safe, Swearengin said. “We try to focus the use [of the Wireless Emergency Alerts] on things people either need to be aware of for their own safety or if they need to take action for their own safety to protect other life or their property,” he said. Swearengin said that because the cell service providers broadcast the messages, they can be received by anyone in a designated area at a given time, including people who may just be passing through, giving the system “a tremendous amount of potential.” However, he said the system does currently have limitations. Each cell service provider sends out Wireless Emergency Alerts based on their company’s cell tower orientation, he said. Depending on which wireless company an individual uses, the quality of cellphone service and a tower’s location in a designated area, some people within a target area may not receive the message. Similarly if a service provider has a stronger tower that covers more than just the target area, many users outside of the intended area could receive a message that was not exactly meant for them. “This is likely what happened [March 18] during the tripwire bomb in South Austin and why some residents a few miles from the [system’s targeted] neighborhood may have received alerts while others didn’t,” he said. Swearengin said the 90-character limit in messages also makes it difficult for entities to perfectly convey what is happening, who is affected and what actions should be taken during an emergency. He said the FCC has passed regulations that would extend the character limit to 360 and would implement new, stricter standards for geolocating cellphone users by November 2019.

Warn Central Texas alerts

WarnCentralTexas.org is a free subscription-based alert system developed by the 11-county Capital Area Council of Governments, or CAPCOG, that gives residents the ability to sign up for specific types of alerts for their community, Austin HSEM spokesperson Angel Flores said. Emergency information, weather service warnings, such as flood and tornado alerts, and general information alerts are available through the system. “We encourage people to sign up their cellphones, their home phones if they have one and their emails,” he said. “[WarnCentralTexas.org] has a much larger character count for us to play with, so for a situation where we have to advise people to take protective action it’s an ideal system. We send those notifications out in English and Spanish.” Flores said another benefit to WarnCentralTexas.org is that because individuals enroll for information about a particular area, they receive updates regardless of where they are during an incident, he said. WarnCentralTexas.org is available to those within the 10-county CAPCOG area, including Travis, Hays, Williamson, Blanco and Burnet counties.

Other local tools

Swearengin said there are other techniques the department uses to get information to residents as well, depending on the particular situation. “There are other tools in the toolbox,” he said. “Sometimes it may be easier to knock on the doors of four homes if there’s a small gas leak on a block instead of sending messages out to a larger population, which could make a small thing seem bigger.” Following local social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter and Nextdoor, such as the city of Austin or the Austin Police Department’s official pages, are great ways to stay informed throughout the day, Flores said.

Twitter accounts to follow

Austin Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management spokesperson Angel Flores said residents looking for updates and alerts online can follow or subscribe to a number of local, certified social media accounts that are updated regularly during emergencies. Other Travis and Williamson County cities and law enforcement groups, such as those in Sunset Valley, Lakeway, Pflugerville and Leander, also have active social media accounts for residents.

• Austin Police Department | @Austin_Police
• Austin Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management  | @AustinHSEM
• Travis County Sheriff’s Department | @TravisCoSheriff
• Austin Fire Department | @AustinFireInfo
• Austin/Travis County EMS | @ATCEMS
• City of Austin | @austintexasgov
• Travis County Emergency Services | @TravisCountyES
• Williamson County Emergency Management | @PreparingWilCo
• ATXFloods | @ATXfloods