South Pasadena accidentally sends an emergency alert test in LA

Shortly before 6 p.m. Tuesday, phones in Los Angeles County lit up with an emergency alert test, the latest example of the challenges cities are experiencing with wireless emergency alert systems.

It was not immediately clear how many people received the test notification from South Pasadena, which read, “This is a test of the South Pasadena WEA system. There is no emergency.” LA Times staff across the country, including in Long Beach, Downtown LA and Redondo Beach, reported receiving the test.

Wireless emergency alerts are sent through a partnership between FEMA, the Federal Communications Commission, cell phone providers and local officials, who geo-code the alerts so they appear on phones in areas affected by public safety alerts.

The flawed test recalls an alert that was mistakenly sent to 10 million phones in L.A. County during the January wildfires, warning them to prepare to evacuate because of the fire. The alert was only meant to be sent to a small number of phones near Calabasas.

On Tuesday evening, public safety staff with the city of South Pasadena were conducting an internal test of the WEA system when the message was randomly sent to phones across the county, city spokeswoman Jennifer Colby said.

The cause of the false alert is under investigation. However, it is currently believed to be the result of human error and not a flaw in the platform called FinalSite that the city uses to send alerts.

She said the mayor apologizes for the trouble caused by the mistake.

Any consequences from a random test alert are unlikely, but the effects of such errors can be serious during an active emergency.

For example, the false alarm that went out during the January wildfires created panic and confusion. This was caused by “sound alerts”, when the message was pinged repeatedly and randomly.

A federal report that looked into the alert issue found that the company contracted by the county to send emergency alerts, Genasis, experienced a technical problem that led to an early, widespread alert. The report found that “buzzing” notifications were a sign of mobile phone providers experiencing overload due to the high volume and long duration of notifications.