Severe weather moving across Western Washington and the Seattle region was unsettling enough on Tuesday. And then a shrieking smartphone alert warned some residents to beware of a potential tornado.
Two tornado warnings were issued by the National Weather Service forecast office in Seattle for locations in Kitsap County, Wash., to the west of Seattle across Elliott Bay. Those warnings triggered two Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) on mobile devices, and according to NWS, there was “some overshoot in the area receiving the message.”
The Kitsap County Department of Emergency Management also issued a shelter in place warning through the WEA system countywide which resulted in a broader overshoot.
The alerts urged residents to take shelter in a basement or on the lowest floor of a sturdy building, and if outside, to beware of flying debris. Across Seattle neighborhoods nowhere near the potential tornado threat, from West Seattle to Ballard to Wallingford and elsewhere, smartphone users received alerts between 11:30 a.m. and noon.
NWS in Seattle tweeted in search of information about how broadly the alerts were transmitted and what wireless carriers may have been impacted. Follow-up tweets let people know there was no tornado threat for Seattle, and no longer any concern elsewhere in Washington.
Did you receive the tornado warnings over your phone? We are getting reports of phones going off outside the warning area. If you did could you please tweet us your location and cell carrier so we can try and get this sorted ( even if you were in the warning area ).Thanks! #wawx
— NWS Seattle (@NWSSeattle) November 9, 2021
NO TORNADO warnings for Seattle! #wawx
— NWS Seattle (@NWSSeattle) November 9, 2021
All the tornado warnings are cancelled. There is still the threat of severe weather in the area today so stay alert! #wawx
— NWS Seattle (@NWSSeattle) November 9, 2021
A joint statement Tuesday from the NWS and Kitsap’s Department of Emergency Management said Wireless Emergency Alerts “may be received outside the targeted alert area (in this case, outside Kitsap County) because WEAs are broadcast from towers in and around the targeted alert area. This strategy maximizes delivery to mobile phones in the targeted alert area, but can cause overshoot where the WEA message is received outside the alert area.”
The agencies further explained that newer cell phones being released will help to eliminate this overshoot.
The statement reiterated that “the WEA system is an essential part of America’s emergency preparedness and has saved lives in weather emergencies where people took action after receiving an emergency alert.”
The WEA system was launched in 2012 and has been used more than 61,000 times to warn the public about dangerous weather, missing children, and other critical situations, according to the Federal Communications Commission.
While the smartphone alerts on Tuesday may have been shocking for some in Seattle, tornados are not unheard of in Western Washington. NWS in Seattle tweeted the dates and locations of some past severe weather events.
A reminder…
1. there is still a threat of severe weather today. Stay alert!
2. Tornadoes can happen in the fall in Western Wa. There was an F3 tornado in Kent Dec. 12th, 1969, F2 tornado in Port Orchard Dec. 18, 2018 & the 1st tornado reported in Seattle Sept. 28, 1962. #wawx— NWS Seattle (@NWSSeattle) November 9, 2021
