Dr. Earl Stoddard, Montgomery County’s Assistant Chief Administrative Officer provided an explanation for the emergency alerting systems used in Montgomery County via social media on Thursday afternoon. It can be seen below:
“I want to speak to some of the emergency alerting systems that get utilized in Montgomery County. For Tornado Warnings, there are two relevant types; Alert Montgomery (alert.montgomerycountymd.gov) & the Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) system, a FEMA managed nationwide alert system.
Alert Montgomery (AM): requires that you register & provide a home address. The home address, not your current location, becomes the basis for how you receive alerts. For most AM alerts, @ReadyMontgomery has a person that reviews the info and determines what geographic area is alerted.
(AM cont) They also decide what the Alert says. For immediate life safety alerts like Tornado Warnings, however, that process has been automated. When National Weather Service sends an alert, it automatically goes out. No human @ReadyMontgomery is involved.
(AM cont) The geographic range for the NWS-driven alerts are determined by the NWS polygons defined in their warning. If you are a few miles outside their range, you likely will not receive the alert.
Now to the WEA system. This does not require registration and is not linked to a home address. Unless you have opted out in your phone, anyone connected to a cell tower that is selected by NWS (or any other authorized sender) will receive a loud, unmistakable tone.
Given my position, I get all the AM alerts. There were more than 10 Tornado Warning alerts sent by NWS as the storm system moved west to east across the County. I received the WEA pictured while sitting in a Kentlands restaurant. Devises throughout went off concurrently.
If you didn’t receive an Alert Montgomery alert and believe your address should have, you can email me at [email protected]. My experience tells me that the majority of concerns will be linked to the registered address being outside the alert area set by NWS.”