46. Why Are Wireless Emergency Alerts on Your Phone So Terrible? A Strategic Communication Conundrum

Lead Balloon - Public Relations, Marketing and Strategic Communications Stories

On January 18, 2018, the entire State of Hawaii received an ear piercing alert on their cell phones.

"BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL."

Those with a keen memory will recall that the Aloha State was NOT, in fact, wiped off the map by a missile strike.

It was a false alarm.

But what it revealed about the Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) system should concern every strategic communicator.

Because while the WEA system has the potential to be a powerful lifesaving tool, it is routinely misused by emergency managers and misunderstood by the public.

With little to no federal oversight, the manner in which this system is used is left up to more than 1,600 local jurisdictions.

As a result, users are being bombarded with too many notifications that are not germane to their immediate safety, and that is conditioning us to ignore potentially life-saving alerts in the future.

So in this episode, we parse lessons from Hawaii's WEA SNAFU with Commander Bhavini Murthy, a medical epidemiologist and researcher with the U.S. Public Health Service, and Dr. John Anderton, the Associate Director for Communication at the Centers for Disease Control’s Office of Readiness and Response.

We learn from an expert on WEA messaging what jurisdictions nationwide are doing incorrectly. Dr. Jeanette Sutton is an Associate Professor in the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity at the State University of New York at Albany.

And, Dusty works to instigate WEA reforms in his own backyard with Milwaukee County Supervisor Shawn Rolland.

By the way, if you've ever wondered what to do in the event of a nuclear missile strike, here are some resources from the CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/radiation/emergencies/index.htm

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