Did your station upgrade its EAS equipment with the new EAS event and location codes?
posted on 8.01.2016This past weekend marked the deadline by which stations had to upgrade and reprogram their EAS equipment with a new nationwide EAS test event code and a new national location code.
The FCC’s 2015 EAS order reviewing the Emergency Alert System set a date of July 30, 2016, to implement several action items, chief among them: having operational EAS equipment capable of processing six zeroes (000000, the national location code pertaining to every state and county in the United States), as well the National Periodic Test (NPT) event code.
The next National Periodic Test of EAS is scheduled for Sept. 28 at 1:20 pm CT and 12:20 pm MT for stations in El Paso.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is conducting the test.
FEMA has set an alternate test date of Oct. 5 in case the Sept. 28 date is scrapped by a real emergency or some other issue.
Stations will be required to report on receipt and dissemination of the NPT using the FCC’s new EAS Test Reporting System (ETRS).
Stations will use ETRS Form Two to do so and this form must be completed before midnight of Sept. 28.
A more detailed report, ETRS Form Three, will be required to be filed by Nov. 14.
As a reminder, stations must be registered in the ETRS database by Aug. 26.
Broadcasters have a little more than three weeks to get signed up for the new filing system using ETRS Form One.
More information about the form and the ETRS registration page link are available on the FCC’s website.
As TAB has reported in previous issues of the TABulletin, the form can be confusing and as such, it may take a station a good deal of time to complete it.
Word to the wise, do not wait until the last minute to do so!
Questions? Contact TAB's Michael Schneider or call (512) 322-9944.
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