6
How Your Weatheradio Works
ˆ
How Your Weatheradio Works
Traditional weather radios simply receive
NOAA’s weather broadcast (usually within a
50-mile radius) then sound an alarm if any
emergency code was transmitted along with
the broadcast. This means that people who
live outside an affected area are often alert-
ed even when their area is not affected,
causing many of them to ignore potentially
real weather warnings that can save lives.
In 1994, the National Oceanic and Atmo-
spheric Administration (NOAA) began broad-
casting coded signals called SAME (Specific
Area Message Encoding) codes along with
their standard weather broadcasts from sta-
tions in your area. These codes identify the
type of emergency and the specific geo-
graphic area (such as a county) affected by
the emergency. Your Weatheradio receives,
interprets, and displays information about the
codes so you can determine if the emergen-
cy might affect your area. Only SAME-com-
patible weather radios (such as this radio)
are able to take advantage of this new
technology.
Each SAME alert includes a FIPS (Federal
Information Processing System) code that
identifies a specific geographic area (defined
by the National Weather Service), so your
Weatheradio sounds an alert only when a
weather emergency is declared in that area.
This helps you more efficiently track the
weather conditions in and around your area.
WHEN A WEATHER ALERT
OCCURS
When the Weatheradio receives a weather
alert:
• it sounds an alert (siren or beep)
• a description of the alert appears
• an indicator on the front of the Weath-
eradio lights
Note: If the Weatheradio receives more than
one weather alert at the same time, it dis-
plays information about each alert.
The alert descriptions your Weatheradio can
display are based on a list of specific weath-
er alert types published by the NWS (Nation-
al Weather Service). For a list of all the alert
descriptions that your Weatheradio can dis-
play, see “NWS Weather Alert Descriptions”
on Page 7.
Caution: The NWS uses sophisticated
weather models to determine an alert’s effec-
tive time. However, the end of an alert does
not necessarily mean that the related weath-
er emergency is over.
New Alert Types
Your Weatheradio is designed to recognize
all common weather alert types currently
used by the NWS. However, the NWS occa-
sionally creates and broadcasts
new alert
types (for which the Weatheradio’s memory
does not contain a specific, corresponding
description). If your Weatheradio receives a
signal for a new alert type, it is preset (if the
alert function is turned on) to display
UN-
KNOWN
, the alert description (
EMERGENC
,
STATEMNT
,
WARNING
, or
WATCH
), and
TUNE
TV
, then sound a siren alert.
12-253.fm Page 6 Tuesday, October 24, 2000 12:27 PM
