Emergency Alert System National Test Next Week

You know the scenario all too well. We've all experienced it at one time or another. You're watching your favorite TV show or listening to that radio program when all of a sudden! A most unwelcome interruption. The phrase "this is a test of the Emergency Alert System" sounds along with a series of meeps and beeps. Annoying yes. But that could save your life during a crisis.

Next week for the very first time, the Emergency Alert System, formerly known as the Emergency Broadcast System, will be tested in a simultaneous national test.

Click here to read about the test

All Radio and Television stations in the United States will pull the switch on the EAS tone on Wednesday, November 9th at approximately 2 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Although local and state components of the system are given a test on a weekly and monthly basis, this is a new layer of protection on a system that's been in place since the early 1960s. Thanks largely to the Internet and new technologies, the early warning system is more capable of spreading urgent messages than ever before. Soon, your smart devices like cellphones and tablet computers will be able to tell you when somethings brewing.

The system's main function is to send out important information regarding weather threats, child abductions, terrorist attacks - just about anything the United States Government deems is important for every American to know. Take Hurricane Irene for instance. When there was an evacuation ordered for many points in the Garden State and here in Ocean County, those alert tones were followed up by instructions on what families should do. Earlier this year when the Fukishima Diachi disaster occurred in Japan following a massive earthquake and tsunami, warnings went over the radio in California about the possibility of a tsunami in the Pacific Ocean. Thankfully, nothing like that happened but if it did, people would have had time to get out.

I went to a shopping center to talk to people in Berkeley Township to see if they knew of the system. While many have heard it and knew the phrase "this is a test," they had no idea what the system does. Some did say they feel this test is long overdue. Others feel it's a waste of time or don't care one way or another.