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Space weather alerts, watches and warnings are issued to emergency responders to provide broad, timely space weather situational awareness across the emergency management community. Products include plain language messaging to briefly outline possible or probable impacts, and expected intensity and duration of the storm.
There are two primary reasons for emergency responder interest in space weather.
- Space weather may directly or indirectly cause or exacerbate a major disaster or emergency (e.g., widespread power grid failure)
- Space weather interferes with or seriously degrades response & recovery capability (e.g., communication problems during major earthquake response)
SWPC Product Subscription Service
Emergency responders at the Local, State, and Federal level sign up and receive watches, warnings and alerts through the SWPC Product Subscription Service (email). But a more formal process is also set up at the Federal level. FEMA will receive NOAA Scale - R 2, S 3, & G 3 alerts, watches and warnings via email. This level of alerting is for situational awareness only.
SWPC Phone Voice Alerts
SWPC phone voice alerts will be issued for NOAA Scale - S 4, S 5 warnings and alerts & G 4, G 5 alerts, watches and warnings (these will also be issued via email).
The FEMA Operations Center (FOC) in Mt. Weather receives the telephone call, as do the FEMA Alternate Centers East (Thomasville, GA) and West (Denver, CO). Upon receiving the telephone alerts, the FOC will:
- Notify FEMA Senior Leadership;
- Issue an Emergency Notification System (ENS) message to agency Watch Centers and other key nodes;
- Consider broadcast over the National Warning System (NAWAS) & Washington Area Warning System (WAWAS) for S 5 & G 5 events
- NAWAS – 2,250 Warning Points to City & County Level
- WAWAS – 125 National Capital Region subscribers
It is important for you to know when the emergency responders in your state or local community receive SWPC alerts and warnings. Emergency responders work closely with WFOs and commercial weather service providers, and may turn to you for information during space weather storm outbreaks.