(COLORADO SPRINGS) — An emergency alert will be sent to those living in El Paso and Teller counties on Sept. 28, but this will be a planned test during an evacuation exercise, not a real emergency.
According to a joint press release, local public safety officials will issue two test emergency alerts during an evacuation exercise in the Broadmoor Bluffs area of Colorado Springs on Saturday, Sept. 28 at 11 a.m.
One of the tests will come through as a Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA), which is a notification from authorized public alerting authorities at the federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial levels. WEAs can be broadcast from cell towers to any WEA-enabled mobile device within a specific local area.
Depending on the age/carrier of your mobile device, you may receive one of the following messages:
- WEA 90 Character Alert: TEST ALERT: This is a test of the wireless emergency alert system. No action required.
- WEA 360 Character Alert: Colorado Springs Police Department: TEST ALERT. First Responders are conducting an EXERCISE in the area of Highway 115 and Star Ranch Rd. Watch for emergency vehicles. This alert is testing public alerting capabilities. NO ACTION REQUIRED.
The other alert will be sent via Peak Alerts. Notifications will display the caller ID (719) 309-4135. Text messages will be from 88911. Emails will be from noreply@everbridge.net. Safety officials urge those signed up for Peak Alerts to store this info on their mobile devices, so it will alert them to important emergency messages from Peak Alerts.
The test Peak Alert will display as the text below:
TEST, TEST, TEST. This is a test of Peak Alerts for the Broadmoor Bluffs Evacuation Exercise. This is only a TEST. If you are participating in this exercise, you should proceed to Harrison High School located at 2755 Janitell Rd for the Safety Fair. You can disregard this alert if you are not participating in the exercise. This concludes the test of Peak Alerts. End Test.
Peak Alerts notify the community of nearby emergencies at their registered address or current location (if using the Everbridge app). You can register your home address, child’s school, work location, and more. To sign up for these alerts, click here.
Peak Alerts notify users regardless of the location of their physical phone. This means registered users receive alerts whether they’re at home, at work, or away from their registered locations. WEAs, however, are sent only to phones in a defined area.
