NOAA Weather Radio (NWR), also known as NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards, is an automated 24-hour network of VHF FM

weather radio A weather radio is a specialized radio receiver that is designed to receive a public broadcast service, typically from government-owned radio stations, dedicated to broadcasting weather forecasts and reports on a continual basis, with the routine w ...

stations in the United States which broadcast weather information directly from a nearby

National Weather Service The National Weather Service (NWS) is an Government agency, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that is tasked with providing weather forecasts, warnings of hazardous weather, and other weathe ...

office. Its routine programming cycle includes local or regional weather forecasts, synopsis, climate summaries or zone/lake/coastal waters forecasts, and can be shortened to specifically include hazardous weather outlooks, short-term forecasts, special weather statements or tropical weather summaries during hazardous weather events. It occasionally broadcasts other non-weather related events such as national security statements, natural disaster information, environmental and public safety statements such as AMBER Alerts, civil emergencies, fires, evacuation orders, and other hazards sourced from the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...

's (FCC)

Emergency Alert System The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a Emergency population warning, national warning system in the United States designed to allow authorized officials to broadcast emergency alerts and warning messages to the public via Cable television, cable ...

. NOAA Weather Radio uses automated broadcast technology that allows for the recycling of segments featured in one broadcast cycle into another and for consistent regular updating of segments to each of the transmitters. Weather radios are widely sold online and in retail stores that specialize in consumer electronics in Canada and the US. They are available in many supermarkets and drugstores in the southern and midwestern US, which are particularly susceptible to severe weather—large portions of these regions are commonly referred to as "

Tornado Alley Tornado Alley, also known as Tornado Valley, is a loosely defined location of the central United States and, in the 21st century, Canada where tornadoes are most frequent. The term was first used in 1952 as the title of a research project to st ...

History

The U.S. Weather Bureau first began broadcasting marine weather information in Chicago and New York City on two VHF radio stations in 1960 as an experiment. Proving to be successful, the broadcasts expanded to serve the general public in coastal regions in the 1960s and early 1970s. By early 1970, ESSA listed 20 U.S. cities using 162.55 MHz and one using 163.275 "ESSA VHF Radio Weather." Later, the U.S. Weather Bureau adopted its current name,

(NWS), and was operating 29 VHF-FM weather-radio transmitters under the

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) is an American scientific and regulatory agency charged with Weather forecasting, forecasting weather, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric conditions, Hydrography, charting the seas, ...

(NOAA) which replaced ESSA in 1970. The service was designed with boaters, fishermen, travelers and more in mind, allowing listeners to quickly receive a "life-saving" weather bulletin from their local weather forecast office (WFO), along with routinely updated forecasts and other climatological data in a condensed format at any time of the day or night. The general public could have the latest weather updates when they needed them, and the benefit of more lead-time to prepare during severe conditions. In 1974, NOAA Weather Radio (NWR), as it was now called, reached about 44 percent of the U.S. population over 66 nationwide transmitters. NWR grew to over 300 stations by the late 1970s. Local NWS staff were the voices heard on NWR stations from its inception until the late 1990s when "Paul" was introduced. The messages were recorded on tape, and later by digital means, then placed in the broadcast cycle. This technology limited the programming variability and locked it into a repetitive sequential order. It also slowed down the speed of warning messages when severe weather happened, because each NWS office could have up to eight transmitters. "Paul" was a computerized voice using the

DECtalk DECtalk is a speech synthesizer and text-to-speech technology that was developed by Digital Equipment Corporation in 1983, based largely on the work of Dennis H. Klatt, Dennis Klatt at MIT, whose source-filter algorithm was variously known as ...

text-to-speech system. "Paul's" voice was dissatisfactory and difficult to understand; thus "Craig", "Tom", "Donna" and later "Javier" were introduced in 2002 using the Speechify text-to-speech system from

SpeechWorks SpeechWorks was a company founded in Boston in 1994 by speech recognition pioneer Mike Phillips and Bill O'Farrell. The Boston-based company developed and supported speech-related computer software. Originally known as Applied Language Technologie ...

(not to be confused with the iOS app of the same name). A completely new voice from the VoiceText text-to-speech system, also named "Paul", was introduced in 2016 and implemented nationwide by late in the year. Live human voices are still used occasionally for weekly tests of the

Specific Area Message Encoding Specific Area Message Encoding (SAME) is a Communications protocol, protocol used for framing and classification of broadcasting Emergency population warning, emergency warning messages. It was developed by the United States National Weather Serv ...

(SAME) and 1,050 Hz tone alerting systems, station IDs, and in the event of system failure or computer upgrades. They will also be used on some stations for updates on the time and radio frequency. In the 1990s, the National Weather Service adopted plans to implement SAME technology nationwide; the roll-out moved slowly until 1995, when the U.S. government provided the budget needed to develop the SAME technology across the entire radio network. Nationwide implementation occurred in 1997 when the

(FCC) adopted the SAME standard as part of its new

(EAS). NOAA Weather Radio's public alerting responsibilities expanded from hazardous weather-only events to "all hazards" being broadcast.

Expansion

In the wake of the

1965 Palm Sunday tornado outbreak The 1965 Palm Sunday tornado outbreak was a historic severe weather event that affected the Midwestern and Southeastern United States on April 10–12, 1965. The tornado outbreak produced 55 confirmed tornadoes in one day and 16& ...

, one of the key recommendations from the U.S. Weather Bureau's storm survey team, was the establishment of a nationwide radio network that could be used to broadcast weather warnings to the general public, hospitals, key institutions, news media, schools, and the public safety community. Starting in 1966, the

Environmental Science Services Administration The Environmental Science Services Administration (ESSA) was a United States federal government, United States Federal executive agency created in 1965 as part of a reorganization of the United States Department of Commerce.

(ESSA) started a nationwide program known as "ESSA VHF Weather Radio Network." In the early 1970s, this was changed to NOAA Weather Radio. The service was expanded to coastal locations during the 1970s in the wake of

Hurricane Camille Hurricane Camille was a powerful, deadly and destructive tropical cyclone which became the second most intense on record to strike the United States (behind the 1935 Labor Day hurricane) and is one of the four Category 5 hurricanes to make ...

based upon recommendations made by the Department of Commerce after the storm in September 1969. Since then, a proliferation of stations have been installed and activated to ensure near-complete geographical coverage and "weather-readiness", many of which have been funded by state

emergency management Emergency management (also Disaster management) is a science and a system charged with creating the framework within which communities reduce vulnerability to hazards and cope with disasters. Emergency management, despite its name, does not actu ...

agencies in cooperation with the NOAA to expand the network, or state public broadcasting networks. To avoid interference and allow for more specific area coverage, the number of frequencies in use by multiple stations grew to two with the addition of 162.400 MHz in 1970 followed by the third (162.475) in 1975 with the remaining four (162.425, 162.450, 162.500 & 162.525) coming into use by 1981. In the 1950s, the Weather Bureau started with KWO35 in New York City and later added KWO39 in Chicago. By 1965 it had added KID77 in Kansas City, home to the Severe Local Storms Center, as the third continuous VHF radio transmitter with the fourth, KBA99 in Honolulu, operating by January 1967. Denver became the 60th NWR station in September 1972 and by December 1976 there were roughly 100 stations transmitting on three channels in December 1976. Growth accelerated in the mid-1970s with NWR reaching 200 radio stations in May 1978 with WXK49 in Memphis, Tennessee; 300 in September 1979 with WXL45 in Columbia, Missouri; and by 1988, the NWS operated about 380 stations covering approximately 90 percent of the nation's population. This grew to over 500 radio stations by May 1999, and over 800 by the end of 2001. As of January 2020, there were about 1,032 stations in operation in fifty states, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, and Saipan, with over 95% effective coverage.

Operations

The NOAA Weather Radio network is provided as a public service by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA also provides secondary weather information, usually limited to marine

storm warning At sea, a storm warning is a warning issued by the National Weather Service of the United States when winds between are occurring or predicted to occur soon. The winds must not be associated with a tropical cyclone. If the winds are associate ...

s for sea vessels navigating the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for se ...

and

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

s, to HF band "time stations" WWV and

WWVH WWVH is the callsign of the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology's shortwave radio time signal station located at the Pacific Missile Range Facility, Pacific Missile Range Facility Barking Sands, in Kekaha, Hawaii, Kekaha, on the ...

. These

shortwave radio Shortwave radio is radio transmission using radio frequencies in the shortwave bands (SW). There is no official definition of the band range, but it always includes all of the High frequency, high frequency band (HF), which extends from 3 to 30& ...

stations continuously broadcast

time signal A time signal is a visible, audible, mechanical, or electronic signal used as a reference to determine the time of day. Church bells or voices announcing hours of prayer gave way to automatically operated chimes on public clocks; however, au ...

s and disseminate the "official" U.S. Government time, and are operated by the

Department of Commerce The United States Department of Commerce (DOC) is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government. It is responsible for gathering data for business ...

National Institute of Standards and Technology The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into Outline of p ...

Radio

The radio service transmits weather and marine forecasts (where applicable) and other related information, without any interruptions. In addition, NWR works in cooperation with the FCC's

(EAS), providing comprehensive severe weather alerts and civil emergency information. In conjunction with federal, state and local emergency managers and other public officials, NWR has the ability to broadcast alerts and post-event information for all types of hazards, including natural (such as

earthquake An earthquakealso called a quake, tremor, or tembloris the shaking of the Earth's surface resulting from a sudden release of energy in the lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those so weak they ...

s or

avalanche An avalanche is a rapid flow of snow down a Grade (slope), slope, such as a hill or mountain. Avalanches can be triggered spontaneously, by factors such as increased precipitation or snowpack weakening, or by external means such as humans, othe ...

s), human-made (such as chemical releases or

oil spill An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially the marine ecosystem, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is usually given to marine oil spills, where oil is released into th ...

s), technological (such as

nuclear power plant A nuclear power plant (NPP), also known as a nuclear power station (NPS), nuclear generating station (NGS) or atomic power station (APS) is a thermal power station in which the heat source is a nuclear reactor. As is typical of thermal power st ...

emergencies) and other public safety (such as " AMBER alerts" or

9-1-1 911, sometimes written , is an emergency telephone number for Argentina, Canada, the Dominican Republic, Fiji, Jordan, Mexico, Pakistan, Maldives, Palau, Panama, Iraq, the Philippines, Sint Maarten, the United States, and Uruguay, as well as ...

telephone outages). Listening to a NOAA Weather Radio station requires a VHF radio receiver or scanner capable of receiving at least one of seven specific VHF-FM channels within the

frequency Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. Frequency is an important parameter used in science and engineering to specify the rate of oscillatory and vibratory phenomena, such as mechanical vibrations, audio ...

range of 162.400 through 162.550 MHz, collectively known as the "Weather Band". For example, a receiver that only tunes in standard AM or FM broadcast stations will not suffice.

Television

Many

cable television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with bro ...

systems and some commercial

television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth's s ...

s will, during EAS activation, rebroadcast the audio of a warning message first heard on their local NWR station, to alert viewers of a severe weather event or civil emergency, usually with the issuance of a

tornado warning A tornado warning ( SAME code: TOR) is a public warning that is issued by weather forecasting agencies to an area in the direct path of a tornado, or a severe thunderstorm capable of producing one, and advises individuals in that area to take c ...

tornado emergency A tornado emergency is an enhanced version of a tornado warning, which is used by the National Weather Service (NWS) in the United States during imminent, significant tornado occurrences. Although it is not a new warning type from the NWS, issue ...

, especially in tornado-prone areas of the country.

Programming

Broadcast schedule

Local NOAA offices update the content broadcast over NOAA Weather Radio transmitters on a regular basis, according to the following schedule: Updates to routine observational products are typically recorded once per hour, and are broadcast at five or 10, and at 15 minutes past the hour.

Broadcast routine

As a continuous spoken weather service, NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards maintains a multi-tier concept for relaying meteorological observations, routine forecasts and weather hazards to the general public. Actual forecasts and offered products vary by the area serviced by the transmitter. During severe weather situations, Watch Information Statements for government-designated jurisdictions served by the local NWR station are typically inserted within the station's normal

playlist A playlist is a list of video or audio files that can be played back on a media player, either sequentially or in a shuffled order. In its most general form, an audio playlist is simply a list of songs that can be played once or in a loop. ...

of routine products; a special severe weather playlist temporarily suspends most regularly scheduled routine products in the event National Weather Service-issued warnings (mainly

severe thunderstorm A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustics, acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorm ...

, tornado or

flash flood warning A flash flood warning ( SAME code: FFW) is a severe weather warning product of the National Weather Service that is issued by national weather forecasting agencies throughout the world to alert the public that a flash flood is imminent or occurri ...

s) are in effect for the station's broadcast area, which solely incorporate watch, warning and Special Weather Statements, and any active Short-Term Forecasts and Hazardous Weather Outlooks. These are additional products that are included in the broadcast cycle occasionally (but are broadcast at randomized times, depending on the individual transmitter : * Air Quality Index Statement * Agricultural Forecast * Area Forecast Discussion * Area Weather Update * Daily/Monthly Hydrometeorological Products * Heat Index Forecast * High Seas Forecast * Hydro-Met Data Report * Miscellaneous Hydrologic Data * Miscellaneous Local Product * Miscellaneous River Product * Public Information Statement * Offshore Forecast * Quantitative Precipitation Forecast * State Forecast * Suppression Forecast * Tabular State Forecast * Terminal Aerodrome Forecast * Travellers Forecast

Weather radio receivers

There are a variety of different types of weather radio receivers available in the U.S., including: * Professional-grade receivers, typically rack-mounted, for use by broadcast radio and television stations and public agencies who are responsible for acting on or retransmitting weather and emergency alert broadcasts. * Base-station consumer radios powered by commercial AC power (often with a battery backup). * Hand-held battery powered radios, suitable for use by hikers, boaters, and in emergency preparedness kits. * Hand-crank portable radios that do not require AC or battery power, especially designed for use in emergency preparedness kits. * Weather radio receivers integrated as an auxiliary function into other devices, such as

GMRS The General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS) is a land-mobile FM UHF radio service designed for short-range two-way voice communication and authorized under part 95 of the US FCC code. It requires a license in the United States, but some GMRS comp ...

radios, portable televisions, FM radios, etc. * Radio receiver modules, such as the Si4707 from

Silicon Labs Silicon Laboratories, Inc., commonly referred to as Silicon Labs, is a fabless global technology company that designs and manufactures semiconductors, other silicon devices and software, which it sells to electronics design engineers and manufac ...

, designed for electronics experimenters and project builders have in the past been available. Historically, it was not uncommon to sell portable radios that featured AM, FM, and TV audio (VHF channels 2–13), with the weather band included some distance down the dial from TV channel 7 (after the U.S. digital TV conversion, the television sound function of these radios became obsolete). One of the early consumer weather alert radios (model KH6TY) was designed and manufactured by Howard (Skip) Teller, who was issued a patent on the alerting mechanism and was instrumental in the design of the

PSK31 PSK31 or "Phase-shift keying, Phase Shift Keying, 31 Baud", also BPSK31 and QPSK31, is a popular computer-sound card-generated radioteletype mode, used primarily by amateur radio operators to conduct real-time keyboard-to-keyboard Synchronous co ...

Digipan software and hardware, and the

Amateur radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency radio spectrum, spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emer ...

NBEMS emergency communications system. Since April 2004, radio models marketed as "Public Alert-certified" must include these features and meet certain performance criteria, as specified in electronics industry standard CEA-2009. The price of a consumer-grade weather radio varies depending on the model and its extra features.

Radio frequencies used

The United States' NWS, Canada's

Weatheradio A weather radio is a specialized radio receiver that is designed to receive a public broadcast service, typically from government-owned radio stations, dedicated to broadcasting weather forecasts and reports on a continual basis, with the routine w ...

, Mexico's SARMEX and Bermuda operate their government weather

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...

s on the same

marine VHF radio Marine VHF radio is a worldwide system of two way radio transceivers on ships and watercraft used for bidirectional voice communication from ship-to-ship, ship-to-shore (for example with harbormasters), and in certain circumstances ship-to-ai ...

band Band or BAND may refer to: Places *Bánd, a village in Hungary * Band, Iran, a village in Urmia County, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Band, Mureș, a commune in Romania * Band-e Majid Khan, a village in Bukan County, West Azerbaijan Province, ...

, using FM transmitters, and the same seven frequencies (162.400 – 162.550 MHz) as NOAA Weather Radio (NWR). Bermuda only uses 162.550 (land) and 162.400 (marine). NWR transmitters operate VHF-FM between 5–1,000 watts. NWR channels operating in the range of 162.3625–162.5875 MHz (162.4–.55 ± 37.5 kHz) have a band spacing of 25 kHz and may have bandwidths up to 16 kHz. The original "weather" frequency used by multiple stations was 162.550 MHz, followed by 162.400 in 1970, 162.475 in 1975, and the last four (162.425, 162.450, 162.500 & 162.525 MHz) in 1981. 163.275 MHz was used by KHB47 in New London, Connecticut initially in 1969 until switching to 162.400 in 1970 to avoid overlapping with KWO35 in New York, and internally by NWS in case of power outage, but is no longer in active use. 169.075 MHz was initially used by WWG75 transmitting from Mt. Haleakala on Maui in 1970 before also switching to 162.400 by 1972.

Channel designations

NOAA Weather Radio,

Weatheradio Canada Weatheradio Canada () is a Canadian weather radio network owned and operated by Environment and Climate Change Canada's Meteorological Service of Canada division. It is one of the two weather radio systems across North America along with the NOAA ...

and SARMEX all refer to the seven stations by their frequencies (MHz): Other channel designations such as WX1 through WX7 "have no special significance but are often designated this way in consumer equipment" and "other channel numbering schemes are also prevalent/possible" according to NOAA and

USCG The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the armed forces of the United States. It is one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, mi ...

. Ordering channels by when they were established (WX1, WX2, ...) is "becoming less 'popular' over time than a numerical ordering of channels." Weather radios may list stations in the order of their WX#, or by a "Preset Channel" number 1 through 7 in ascending frequency order. The "WX#" format is continued from WX8 up to WX12 on some lists and radios to include 163.275 MHz and or one or more of the Canadian

continuous marine broadcast A continuous marine broadcast, or CMB, is a marine weather broadcasting servicehttps://www.dxinfocentre.com/cmb.htm operated by the Canadian Coast Guard. CMBs are programmed from the various Marine Communications and Traffic Services centres on th ...

(CMB) frequencies 161.650, 161.775, 161.750, 162.000. Unlike WX1-WX7 typically ordered by frequency adoption by NWS, there is no consistent frequency inclusion nor assignment for WX8-WX12. Effective January 1, 2019, channels 2027 (161.950 MHz, 27B) and 2028 (162.000 MHz, 28B) are designated as ASM 1 and ASM 2 respectively for application specific messages (ASM) as described in Recommendation ITU-R M.2092. The "WX" arose from the Morse code prosign shorthand for weather reports (WX) combined with the order number that the seven frequencies were adopted for use nationally. More frequencies helped prevent

interference Interference is the act of interfering, invading, or poaching. Interference may also refer to: Communications * Interference (communication), anything which alters, modifies, or disrupts a message * Adjacent-channel interference, caused by extra ...

from other nearby transmitters, growing in use in the 1990s in less populated

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry are typically desc ...

, areas and as fill-in

broadcast translator A broadcast relay station, also known as a satellite station, relay transmitter, broadcast translator (U.S.), re-broadcaster (Canada), repeater (two-way radio) or complementary station (Mexico), is a broadcast transmitter which repeats (or tran ...

s relaying an existing station or sending a separate, more localized broadcast into remote or

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...

ous areas, or those areas with reception trouble. As with conventional broadcast television and radio signals, it may be possible to receive more than one of the seven weather channels at a given location, dependent on factors such as the location, transmitter power,

range Range may refer to: Geography * Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra) ** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands * Range, a term used to i ...

and designated coverage area of each station. The NWS suggests that users determine which frequency (as opposed to channel) is intended for their specific location so that they are assured of receiving correct and timely information.

Present day

All seven NWR channels are available on stand-alone weather radio receivers that are sold online and in retail stores (available for prices ranging from US$20 and up), as well as on most

transceiver In radio communication, a transceiver is an electronic device which is a combination of a radio ''trans''mitter and a re''ceiver'', hence the name. It can both transmit and receive radio waves using an antenna, for communication purposes. The ...

amateur radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency radio spectrum, spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emer ...

s and digital scanners. In addition, more mainstream consumer electronics, such as

clock radio An alarm clock or alarm is a clock that is designed to alert an individual or group of people at a specified time. The primary function of these clocks is to awaken people from their night's sleep or short naps; they can sometimes be used for o ...

s, portable multi-band receivers and two-way radios (such as FRS,

and

CB radio Citizens band radio (CB radio) is a land mobile radio system, a system allowing short-distance one-to-many bidirectional voice communication among individuals, using two-way radios operating near 27 MHz (or the 11-m wavelength) in the high freq ...

), now feature the ability to also receive NWR channels. Many of the aforementioned devices also incorporate automatic alerting capabilities. Many American television stations offer discounted pricing for radios to viewers as a public courtesy (especially in highly tornado-prone areas), where they are often marketed as an essential safety device on par with a

smoke alarm A smoke detector is a device that senses smoke, typically as an indicator of fire. Smoke detectors/alarms are usually housed in plastic enclosures, typically shaped like a disk about in diameter and thick, but shape and size vary. Smoke can be ...

for home fires.

Coverage

According to NOAA, reliable signal reception typically extends in about 40 miles radius from a full-power (1,000 W) transmitter, depending on level terrain. However, signal blockages can occur, especially in mountainous areas. As of 2016, there are over a thousand NWR transmitters across the U.S., covering 95% of the population. Because each transmitter can cover several counties, typically a person will program their weather radio to receive only the alerts for their county or nearby surrounding counties where weather systems are most likely to move in from.

Alerting

Whenever a weather or civil emergency alert is issued for any part of a NWR station's coverage area, many radios with an alert feature will sound an alarm or turn on upon detection of a that sounds just before the voice portion of an alert message. The specification calls for the NWS transmitter to sound the alert

tone Tone may refer to: Visual arts and color-related * Tone (color theory), a mix of tint and shade, in painting and color theory * Tone (color), the lightness or brightness (as well as darkness) of a color * Toning (coin), color change in coins * ...

for ten

second The second (symbol: s) is a unit of time derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes, and finally to 60 seconds each (24 × 60 × 60 = 86400). The current and formal definition in the International System of U ...

s and for the receiver to react to it within five seconds. This system simply triggers the alarm or turns on the radio of every muted receiver within reception range of that NWR station (in other words, any receiver located ''anywhere'' within the transmitter's broadcast area). Generally, receivers with this functionality are either older or basic models. Many newer or more sophisticated alerting receivers can detect, decode and react to a digital signal called

(SAME), which allows users to program their radios to receive alerts only for specific geographical areas of interest and concern, rather than for an entire broadcast area. These advanced models may also have colored

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

status lights which indicate the level of the alert as an "advisory"/"statement", "watch" or "warning" (either amber or green for advisories and statements, orange or yellow for watches, red for warnings). When an alert is transmitted, the is broadcast first (heard as three repeated audio "bursts"), followed by the 1,050 Hz attention tone, then the voice message, then the end-of-message (EOM) data signal (repeated quickly three times). This encoding/decoding technology has the advantage of avoiding "false alarms" triggered by the 1,050 Hz tone itself in locations outside the intended warning area. Broadcast areas are generally divided into SAME locations by county or marine zone using the standard U.S. Government FIPS county codes. NOAA's SAME alert protocol was later adopted and put into use by the

(EAS) in 1997 – the replacement for the earlier

Emergency Broadcast System The Emergency Broadcast System (EBS), sometimes called the Emergency Action Notification System (EANS), was an Emergency population warning, emergency warning system used in the United States. It was the most commonly used, along with the Local ...

(EBS) and even earlier

CONELRAD CONELRAD (''Control of Electromagnetic Radiation'') was a method of emergency broadcasting to the public of the United States in the event of enemy attack during the Cold War. It was intended to allow continuous broadcast of civil defense informa ...

– now required by the FCC for standard broadcast TV and radio stations.

Environment Canada Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC; )Environment and Climate Change Canada is the applied title under the Federal Identity Program; the legal title is Department of the Environment (). is the Ministry (government department), department ...

eventually integrated SAME alerting capability into its

network in 2004. Organizations are able to disseminate and coordinate emergency alerts and warning messages through NOAA Weather Radio and other public systems by means of the

Integrated Public Alert and Warning System The Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) is an architecture that unifies the United States' Emergency Alert System, National Warning System, Wireless Emergency Alerts, and NOAA Weather Radio, under a single platform. IPAWS was desig ...

. In September 2008,

Walgreens Walgreens is an American pharmacy store chain. It is the second largest in the United States, behind CVS Pharmacy. As of March 2025, the company operated more than 8,700 stores in the U.S. Walgreens has been the subject of a number of lawsuit ...

announced that it would utilize SAME technology to deliver local weather alerts via a system of LED

billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

s located outside its drugstore locations to provide an additional avenue of weather information. Many national billboard companies (such as

Outfront Media Outfront Media, Inc. (stylized as OUTFRONT/) is an American advertising company. It operates in markets including the United States and Canada. The Americas division is led by interim chief executive officer Nick Brien. Outfront Media operates b ...

Clear Channel Outdoor Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings, Inc. is a multinational corporation focused on outdoor advertising. The company is based in San Antonio, Texas. Together with JCDecaux, it is one of the largest outdoor advertising companies. History Founding ...

and Lamar, among others) also use their color LED billboard networks to display weather warnings to drivers, while state-owned freeway notification boards, which utilize the EAS/NOAA infrastructure for AMBER Alerts, also display weather warnings.

Emergency alert test procedure

Every local National Weather Service weather forecast office is required to conduct a scheduled weekly test of the NOAA Weather Radio public alert system, generally occurring every Wednesday between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. (noon). Certain Weather Forecast Offices conduct this twice a week, usually testing two time on Wednesday, usually between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. (noon) and then again between 6:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. Other offices test once on Wednesday, and then again on Saturday. Some NOAA Weather Radio stations also broadcast tests of the

on predetermined days and times. If there is a threat of severe weather that day in a NWR station's listening area, the weekly test is postponed until the next available fair-weather day (sometimes, a short message stating the reason for the test's cancellation is broadcast). The required weekly test (SAME event code "RWT") interrupts regular NWR programming — during the test, a SAME data header is sent, followed by a 1050 Hz attention tone, the voice test message, then a SAME end-of-message (EOM) signal. The text of the test message used by most NWS offices, with variations depending on the office, is typically as follows: Or, for other offices which test on Wednesday:

Voices

From the introduction of NOAA Weather Radio until the late 1990s, nearly all the voices heard in the broadcasts were those of the staff at local

(NWS) offices. The messages were manually recorded, first on tape cartridges and later digitally, and then placed in the broadcast cycle. As the NWS added more transmitters to provide broader radio coverage, the staff had difficulty keeping broadcast cycles updated in a timely fashion, especially during major severe weather outbreaks.

System upgrades

1990s Console Replacement System

To manage the increasing number of transmitters for each office and to speed the overall delivery of warning messages to the public, the Console Replacement System (CRS) was deployed at NWS weather forecast offices in 1997. CRS introduced a computerized voice nicknamed "Paul", using a

text-to-speech Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or Computer hardware, hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system conv ...

system which was based on the

technology. This system was chosen over more readily available

concatenative synthesis Concatenative synthesis is a technique for synthesising sounds by concatenating short samples of recorded sound (called ''units''). The duration of the units is not strictly defined and may vary according to the implementation, roughly in the range ...

because each forecast, watch and warning requires unique wording to relay the most accurate and relevant information. Concatenation is typically used by telephone companies, banks and other service businesses where a limited vocabulary of recorded words can easily take the place of specific, repetitive phrases and sentences. NOAA Weather Radio broadcasts contain a wide variety of information which changes with the weather. Forecasters need to have many words to choose from when writing their forecasts and warnings for the public. Although CRS greatly enhanced the delivery speed and scheduling of Weather Radio messages, some listeners disliked Paul's voice, as it was very monotone and did not resemble a normal speaking voice due to CRS not having the technological advances at the time to resemble human speech patterns.

2002 Voice Improvement Program

In 2002, the National Weather Service contracted with Siemens Information and Communication and

to introduce improved, more natural voices. The Voice Improvement Plan (VIP) was implemented, involving a separate computer processor linked into CRS that fed digitized sound files to the broadcast suite. The improvements involved one male voice ("Craig"), and one female voice ("Donna"). Additional upgrades in 2003 improved "Donna" and introduced an improved male voice nicknamed "Tom", which had variable intonation based on the urgency of the report. As part of this upgrade, a Spanish voice, "Javier", was added at a few sites. Due to the superior quality of the "Tom" voice, most NWS offices used it for the majority of broadcasts and announcements.

Broadcast Message Handler

In 2016, the NWS replaced almost all of the CRS systems in operation at its Weather Forecast Offices—which had been in use for over 20 years and were approaching the end of the system's expected service life—with the Broadcast Message Handler (BMH). The new system is more closely integrated with the

AWIPS The Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) is a technologically advanced processing, display, and telecommunications system that is the cornerstone of the United States National Weather Service's (NWS) operations. AWIPS is a com ...

software and intended to be more reliable. The BMH units replaced "Donna" and "Tom" with an improved "Paul" voice (its classification from new voice partner NeoSpeech). Many stations have dubbed him "Paul II" or "Paul Jr" to avoid confusion with CRS "Perfect Paul". For the NWS offices that incorporate Spanish programming into the NWR broadcast cycle, VIP "Javier" was replaced with a much improved female voice named "Violetta" (another voice from NeoSpeech). The upgrade initially began at six offices: Greenville-

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;

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;

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;

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;

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; and

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. Many of the stations saw an initial negative reaction primarily due to many mispronunciations. Most local NWS Offices provide a method of reporting these problems, and have the ability to reprogram the voices accordingly.

Human voices

Human voices are still heard on occasion, but sparingly, mainly during station identifications, public forecasts,

National Marine Fisheries Service The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), informally known as NOAA Fisheries, is a United States federal agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that is responsible for the ste ...

messages, public information statements,

public service announcement A public service announcement (PSA) is a message in the public interest disseminated by the media without charge to raise public awareness and change behavior. Oftentimes these messages feature unsettling imagery, ideas or behaviors that are des ...

s, required weekly tests, and severe weather events. The capability exists for a meteorologist to broadcast live on any transmitter if computer problems occur or added emphasis is desired, or to notify listeners who are concerned about a silent station on another frequency whether that station is dark due to technical errors, prolonged

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, or a weather event has forced it off the air.

Broadcasting in Spanish

Some weather forecast offices will issue a secondary report in

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

during severe weather events or warnings. Few NWR stations broadcast weather information in Spanish. Four offices use dedicated stations which broadcast in the Spanish language, separate from their corresponding English-language channels:

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(WNG712 in

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/ Riverside),

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(WNG652),

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(WZ2531 in

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, since 2012), and Brownsville (WZ2541 in

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and WZ2542 in Harlingen, since 2014). These stations originally used a synthesized Spanish male voice named "Javier" for all broadcasts, but have since been upgraded with the BMH female voice "Violetta". The

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WFO often repeats weather alerts in Spanish after their initial dissemination in English. Station WXJ69 in

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broadcasts all information, including forecasts, in the same manner.

Live streaming

Several websites provide internet audio streaming of a subset of the NOAA Weather radio stations. The most prominent of these, the Wunderadio section of weather information website

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, discontinued live streams of NWR broadcasts in April 2017. As the Wunderadio internet streaming service dissolved, many other sources developed, allowing previous users of the service to continue monitoring live streams from Wunderadio, as well as newer broadcasts from different locations.

References

External links

NWS Organization
(shows all NOAA offices)
U.S. NOAA Weather Radio page

ESSA News September 11, 1970

NOAA Weather Radio brochure evolution

"ESSA VHF Weather Radio Stations" Weatherwise magazine, August 1969
* tp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NOAA_historic_documents/ESSA/ESSA_PI/PI_680033.pdf Marine Weather Services: ESSA VHF Radio Weather, ESSA/PI 680033 1969
Marine Weather Services: ESSA VHF Radio Weather, ESSA/PI 680033 1970
* tp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NOAA_historic_documents/NOAA_historical_brochures/Weather/NWS-WeatherRadio1970.pdf NOAA VHF Radio Weather, NOAA/PI 70035, 1970
NOAA VHF Radio Weather, NOAA/PA 70035, Rev. 1972

Marine Weather Services: NOAA VHF Radio Weather, NOAA/PA 70029, Rev. 1972
* [ftp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NOAA_historic_documents/NOAA_historical_brochures/Weather/NWS-MarineWeatherServices-1974.pdf Marine Weather Services: NOAA VHF Radio Weather, NOAA/PA 70029, Rev. 1974] * [ftp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NOAA_historic_documents/NOAA_historical_brochures/Weather/NWS-WeatherRadio-1975.pdf NOAA Weather Radio NOAA/PA 74035, 1975]
Marine Weather Services: NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 74034, Rev. 1976
* tp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NOAA_historic_documents/NOAA_historical_brochures/Weather/NWS-WeatherRadio-1976.pdf NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 76015, 1976
NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 76015, Rev. July 1988
* tp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NWS/Brochures/NOAA_weather_radio_May_1999.pdf NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 96070 (station list), May 1999
NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 200356 (maps), October 2002

All Hazards NOAA Weather Radio (NWR), NOAA/PA 96070 (no list), October 2007
* tp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NWS/Brochures/NOAA_weather_radio_April_2014.pdf, NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards (NWR), NOAA/PA 200352 Poster, April 2014
All Hazards NOAA Weather Radio, NOAA/PA 94062, Rev. January 2020
{{SevWea nav 1950s establishments in the United States Disaster preparedness in the United States Emergency Alert System Weather radio National Weather Service Bandplans Types of radios Weather warnings and advisories