National Emergency Alert Test to be Conducted on Wednesday

WASHINGTON D.C.-- Wednesday at 2:20 p.m. will catch the attention of the whole country, as there is a plan in place to test out emergency and wireless alert systems within our nation.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced in a news release back in August, that they plan to send an emergency text message to all cell phones, but only for testing purposes.

This action was implemented by government authorities to test the effectiveness of emergency alert systems in our country.

This will be the third nationwide test for these WEA systems.

The test will cause a message ringing noise to be sent to every cell phone. The message will read:

“This is a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System, issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, covering the United States from 14:20 to 14:50 hours ET. This is only a test. No action is required by the public."

This Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) will last for 30 minutes, and the initial notification will mirror that of an ‘Amber Alert’ and can be stopped with the push of a button.

Those whose cell phones are off before the alert will not be able to turn their phones back on until the 30 minutes are over.

There is no action required by any cell phone user.

Brendan Conroy is a fourth-year student studying broadcast journalism. To contact him email him at brc5392@psu.edu.