I see back at home that the Irish Government have recently conducted a test of an emergency broadcast system for Radio & TV that relays urgent messages in the event of a national disaster, terrorist incident or property crash (too late for the latter).

A quote from the government press release [1] is a bit worrying:

The Government Task Force on Emergency Planning considers that in the event of an emergency, broadcast media will be the most efficient vehicle for the transmission of emergency messages to the public.

Really? My problem is that, like a growing proportion of people out there in this day and age, I rarely use either medium. Sure I am the exception in not watching much tv (an hour or two a week), but in this day and age, how many people actually watch their terrestrial broadcasters? A fair chunk yes, but a reducing proportion in most western countries when you have so many other crap satellite channels to flick through.

So what is left? Well the two communication mediums I use most are Internet and mobile phone. An Internet based emergency broadcast would be technically difficult, though it could be done.

An emergency broadcast via mobile phones would make more sense. This could easily be done via SMS to every phone in the country. That would have a far higher penetration level, and I am pretty sure that you could geographically target these messages by only alerting phones registered to base stations in particular areas. This might be a more costly implementation than just relaying a simple message over TV and Radio, but ultimately more effective which is what you need in the event of an emergency right?

This idea of a TV & Radio broadcast seems to be rooted in the 1950′s. Technology has advanced a bit since then. Don’t have a mobile phone? Well, technology does exist to send an automated message to landlines too. There seems to be a lack of any real forethought in this.

And lastly, the department seemed delighted that all the broadcasters were able to carry out the test at short notice in the early hours of the morning:

The timing of the exercise was deliberately chosen to test the response times of the broadcasters. Most stations are unmanned in the early ours of the morning and it was considered an excellent simulation of an emergency situation where stations would have to react quickly in unusual circumstances.

Eh yeah, well done. But not many people are going to get an emergency message if their tv or radio is switched off and they are asleep are they? If it so important you have to take over the airwaves to relay a message, then maybe go the extra step and wake up the recipients?

[1] Government press release on the broadcast