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Got my first Emergency Alert on VzW iPhone 5

smithrh

smithrh

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Feb 28, 2009
2,722
1,730
Otherwise known as CMAS... This was for a Tornado Warning.

It sounds like the tone you hear on TV when there's a test or warning, except that the tone cycles on and off about 5-7 times. It's fairly distinctive.

The alert is was displayed on the phone much the way notifications used to be shown (rounded edge box with text inside). It had a funky symbol in it...

The text was explaining that there was a Tornado Warning for my area, take cover and the duration of the warning and to "check local media."

What's pretty cool is that:

a) the warning came about 2 minutes before the weather hit

b) I got notified about 1 minute before the sirens went off.

So, there's your confirmation that CMAS is built into the iPhone 5 - at least on Verizon. Don't remember if ATT is participating in CMAS.

Don't look for the message to be in Messages - it's only in the Notification center.
 
D

DeltaHF

macrumors regular
May 14, 2008
111
90
First I have heard of this.

Is it a feature which needs to be activated? Does it automatically take your location into account and send you alerts for your immediate area?
 
tymaster50

tymaster50

Suspended
Oct 3, 2012
2,833
58
Oregon
smithrh said:
Otherwise known as CMAS... This was for a Tornado Warning.

It sounds like the tone you hear on TV when there's a test or warning, except that the tone cycles on and off about 5-7 times. It's fairly distinctive.

The alert is was displayed on the phone much the way notifications used to be shown (rounded edge box with text inside). It had a funky symbol in it...

The text was explaining that there was a Tornado Warning for my area, take cover and the duration of the warning and to "check local media."

What's pretty cool is that:

a) the warning came about 2 minutes before the weather hit

b) I got notified about 1 minute before the sirens went off.

So, there's your confirmation that CMAS is built into the iPhone 5 - at least on Verizon. Don't remember if ATT is participating in CMAS.

Don't look for the message to be in Messages - it's only in the Notification center.
Click to expand...
did you have on location services?
 
G

gentlefury

macrumors 68030
Jul 21, 2011
2,866
23
Los Angeles, CA
I wish you could set it to be less horribly obnoxious tho! If you have your phone on silent it keeps buzzing like a call, and if the ringer is on its a really loud tone! I got 2 on fri for Flash Flood warning in Santa Monica...and it was beautiful out all day. It was because it was pouring in the valley.

For those that can't find it...it is not available to AT&T customers. I know as a fact its on Verizon...I don't know about Sprint or T-Mobile.
 
S

stickybuns

macrumors 6502
Oct 22, 2011
384
0
Last week, both my husband (Droid Razr Maxx) and I (iPhone 4S) received Flash Flood warnings from Verizon. Very handy safety feature.
 
M

MoonlightSonata

macrumors newbie
Aug 23, 2012
14
0
California, USA
smithrh said:
Otherwise known as CMAS... This was for a Tornado Warning.

It sounds like the tone you hear on TV when there's a test or warning, except that the tone cycles on and off about 5-7 times. It's fairly distinctive.

The alert is was displayed on the phone much the way notifications used to be shown (rounded edge box with text inside). It had a funky symbol in it...

The text was explaining that there was a Tornado Warning for my area, take cover and the duration of the warning and to "check local media."

What's pretty cool is that:

a) the warning came about 2 minutes before the weather hit

b) I got notified about 1 minute before the sirens went off.

So, there's your confirmation that CMAS is built into the iPhone 5 - at least on Verizon. Don't remember if ATT is participating in CMAS.

Don't look for the message to be in Messages - it's only in the Notification center.
Click to expand...
That is pretty cool!
 
lelisa13p

lelisa13p

macrumors 68000
Mar 6, 2009
1,946
47
Atlanta, GA USA
Not located in my AT&T iPhone 5. Luckily, I have the WeatherRadio app, which puts alerts in the Notification Center. Has notified me many times in the last 3 years.
 
theonekcrow

theonekcrow

macrumors 6502a
Jul 12, 2009
867
150
Indiana
Sounds like that works very well. Hope it comes to the AT&T iPhone 5 soon! Get on the ball AT&T!!!

Btw, any screenshots, to see what they look like?
 
scaredpoet

scaredpoet

macrumors 604
Apr 6, 2007
6,627
342
Those are gonna be fun to wake up to at 3 AM. :rolleyes:

And yes, if your local administrator for these alerts is that obnoxious about it, it WILL happen. Comcast in my area participates in a similar program for their cable boxes, and I made the mistake of falling asleep once with the TV on. Ended up being awakened to a blaring Amber Alert at high volume in the middle of the night, that applied to a town maybe 50 miles away.

At least with the wireless alerts, you can opt out of them, though apparently that can be overridden at the federal executive (white house) level.
 
D

DodgeV83

macrumors 6502a
Feb 8, 2012
879
6
scaredpoet said:
Those are gonna be fun to wake up to at 3 AM. :rolleyes:

And yes, if your local administrator for these alerts is that obnoxious about it, it WILL happen. Comcast in my area participates in a similar program for their cable boxes, and I made the mistake of falling asleep once with the TV on. Ended up being awakened to a blaring Amber Alert at high volume in the middle of the night, that applied to a town maybe 50 miles away.

At least with the wireless alerts, you can opt out of them, though apparently that can be overridden at the federal executive (white house) level.
Click to expand...

I would very much like to be woken up at 3am if there's a dangerous tornado coming! Tornados don't care what time it is :)

Amber alerts though...
 
lelisa13p

lelisa13p

macrumors 68000
Mar 6, 2009
1,946
47
Atlanta, GA USA
scaredpoet said:
Those are gonna be fun to wake up to at 3 AM. :rolleyes:

And yes, if your local administrator for these alerts is that obnoxious about it, it WILL happen. Comcast in my area participates in a similar program for their cable boxes, and I made the mistake of falling asleep once with the TV on. Ended up being awakened to a blaring Amber Alert at high volume in the middle of the night, that applied to a town maybe 50 miles away.

At least with the wireless alerts, you can opt out of them, though apparently that can be overridden at the federal executive (white house) level.
Click to expand...

I get these alerts in the middle of the nite (sometimes testing at 3:00 am) via Comcast and the volume is always the same as the TV show that they interrupt. The tone is extremely obnoxious, true, and gets your attention, which is the point after all. Maybe you had muted a loud volume & it overrode?

Those alerts usually come on when I'm watching something that I've spooled by pausing the DVR and the alert always kills that function. Missed the ending of many movies that way. :mad:

----------
tymaster50 said:
Still nobody ever told me if you need location services on to get these alerts.
Click to expand...

I would guess the answer is Yes. GPS would need to locate you WRT area of alert.
 
SandboxGeneral

SandboxGeneral

Moderator emeritus
Sep 8, 2010
26,482
10,051
Detroit
Here is more technical information right from the FCC regarding the CMAS alerts.

The FCC took a number of steps in facilitating the ability of consumers to receive emergency alerts through their wireless phones. In 2008, the Commission issued a series of orders adopting requirements for a Commercial Mobile Alert System (CMAS), a system by which commercial mobile service (CMS) providers may transmit emergency alerts to their subscribers, if they choose to do so.
Click to expand...

The rest of the article.
 
D

darster

Suspended
Aug 25, 2011
1,703
1
This is why you have the option to turn it off. If you don't want to hear it, disable it. The alerts are county based. The warning will go off if you are in the county that is being warned for, even if you are 20 miles away from where it is occurring and not actually inside the warning box. The National Weather Service issues polygon shaped warnings with coordinates points based on latitude/longitude. As of right now, the alert system on your phone is not capable of determining whether our not you are inside that warning polygon, only if you are in that county. So if the warning is out for the eastern part of your county, and you live in the western part, you will still get the alert.

Here is more info on this feature

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/com/weatherreadynation/wea.html#faq8
 
tymaster50

tymaster50

Suspended
Oct 3, 2012
2,833
58
Oregon
lelisa13p said:
I get these alerts in the middle of the nite (sometimes testing at 3:00 am) via Comcast and the volume is always the same as the TV show that they interrupt. The tone is extremely obnoxious, true, and gets your attention, which is the point after all. Maybe you had muted a loud volume & it overrode?

Those alerts usually come on when I'm watching something that I've spooled by pausing the DVR and the alert always kills that function. Missed the ending of many movies that way. :mad:

----------



I would guess the answer is Yes. GPS would need to locate you WRT area of alert.
Click to expand...

That would kinda defeat the purpose because not everyone has location services turned on all the time, I don't because Saga will kill my battery like that.
 
D

DrakeMcEachern

macrumors 6502
Mar 10, 2012
294
18
tymaster50 said:
Still nobody ever told me if you need location services on to get these alerts.
Click to expand...

No location services required to get these alerts. When there is a warning issued, all the phones capable of receiving alerts will sound based on which tower they are connected to.
 
Europa13

Europa13

macrumors 6502
Feb 1, 2009
446
685
Where is this setting? I looked for it under Settings > General > Notifications > Alerts, but I don't have that setting.

I'm using an AT&T iPhone 5.
 
smithrh

smithrh

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Feb 28, 2009
2,722
1,730
Lots of... uhhh.. bad information in this thread - let me make some gentle corrections...

The way CMAS is designed is to take advantage of the fact that cell sites (and sectors within those cell sites) have a known coverage area.

When an alert needs to go out (Tornado Warning!), the agency will select where the warning needs to go out geographically. There's a server that takes that geographic area and maps it out to cells and sectors.

Then the warning is sent to those cells and sectors, and any phone with the mobile side of CMAS is supposed to emit the alarm.

This way, there's no location services needed - at all. Your phone is constantly monitoring for CMAS messages the way it's looking for texts and incoming calls. Now, it's a bit different in that this is a broadcast, sent to every phone in the sector.

Having said that, I'm sure there are limitations still in drawing the right areas for the alerts. It may be indeed be by county - but I know that's not where we'll wind up, it will be very targeted alerts. Why? Look up in this thread, people have been alerted for incidents that had nothing to do with them.

The designers of CMAS (I know some, dontcha know) are aware of this, and the ultimate goal is to only notify you if you're going to be impacted.
 
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