FEMA Lab to Assess Advanced Emergency Alerting Technology
Life-Saving Technology Will Leverage ATSC 3.0 Standard
In anticipation of next-generation broadcasting with ATSC 3.0, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is assessing the feasibility of advanced new broadcast public alert and warning technology, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced.
ATSC Advanced Emergency Alerting will leverage the new capabilities inherent in ATSC 3.0 to deliver rich media alerts. One implementation, called the Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN), is designed to transmit video, photographs, text, evacuation routes, maps, plume models, radar images, html pages, shelter information, Amber Alerts and more. The use of Internet Protocol technology with ATSC 3.0 will allow this new application to fully integrate with other IP networks, including those used for emergency communications.
Under its National Continuity Programs, FEMA is gathering data and assessing the capabilities of ATSC 3.0 Advanced Emergency Alerting at its test lab for IPAWS, the U.S. Integrated Public Alert and Warning System. The lab intends to determine how effectively the future technologies like the AWARN broadcast system can work within the IPAWS alerting infrastructure.
“FEMA is committed to working with the private sector to examine and improve future alerts and warnings,” said Roger Stone, Acting Assistant Administrator for National Continuity Programs. “New systems could someday include pictures and video as part of the advanced alert and warning information provided to the general public.”
Testing at the IPAWS Lab at the Joint Interoperability Test Command in Indian Head, Md., ultimately will demonstrate the feasibility and operational deployment of AWARN within the IPAWS suite of technologies and allow public safety officials to gain confidence using IPAWS in a secure environment, according to FEMA.
AWARN’s equipment will be put through its paces at the IPAWS Lab, where closed-environment testing will be employed to assess its capabilities. Initial FEMA testing with first-generation M-EAS technology lays the groundwork for further testing of the very robust advanced alerting system as the ATSC 3.0 standards process proceeds over the next year. Just as with Mobile EAS using the current ATSC standard
Posted in ATSC News
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