What you should know for FEMA’s Emergency Alert System test Wednesday

This is a test. That’s the message that will go out nationwide at 2:20 PM Eastern Time as FEMA, along with the FCC, test the Emergency Alert System (EAS) as well as the Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) system.

The notice will go to televisions and radios, as well as smart phones that have opted in to emergency alerts.

We'll be conducting a national test in coordination with @FCC of the Emergency Alert System at 2:20 PM ET on Aug 11. The test will go to televisions & radios, while specially configured cell phones will receive an emergency alert test code message. #IPAWShttps://t.co/var1irGebr pic.twitter.com/0eZEaLmtTS

— FEMA (@fema) August 9, 2021

The test is scheduled to go for about thirty minutes. It will consist of two different parts, one for the WEA and one for the EAS.

The WEA portion will go to cell phones where the user has opted in to receive test messages. This will be the first time such a test will be done. WEA has been tested before, but this is the first time it will be tested only with people who opt-in.

The message be displayed in either English or Spanish depending on how the user has configured her phone.

This will be the sixth nationwide EAS test.