Hey everyone, it is that time again: the national alarm day (bundesweiter Warntag) of 2024 is upon us!
Context: every second thursday in september, both federal and local catastrophe alarm systems get tested, both to ensure their functionality and create awareness amoung the population. Locals systems may include sirens, but since not every city and muncipality has operational sirens and it is optional for muncipalities to take part in the test, there may be none audible where you are. What you are likely to experience no matter your location within germany are the warning systems using mobile phones: Alerts in warn apps like NINA, and the Cell Bradcast network. Orther possible alarm sistems that might be triggered are radio and television broadcast as well as public electronic displays, like those by transportation providers.
Cell Broadcast warnings will be sent to phones that have at least Android Version 11 or iOS 16.1 as their operation system, that are switched on and not in airplane mode. Depending on your exact phone, there may be the necessity to manually opt in to recieve the warning. Further info on this can be found here on the website of the responsible federal agency, but it is sadly only avaliable in german.
Important to know about Cell Broadcast: The phone being on silent will not stop the warning, including the loud noise and vibration that comes with it. So if you are in a precarious situation where you, for example, have a hidden phone that your parents or partner cannot know about, make sure to switch them off fully, remove the battery if possible. Same goes if you want to avoid the noise that might scare pets or vulnerable people living with you. In that case, also make sure you check if your muncipality will use sirens or other local alarm systems and secure the pets and inform the people that this is just a test.
After the test, a survey will be avaliabe online and via the NINA app that will ask on what alarm channels you were or were not reached during the test. that info is very important to assess the functionality and flaws of our alarm system, so i would encurage everyone to take part in it.
So yeah: if you hear sirens and your phone freaks out tomorrow at 11 am, keep calm. It is just a test, everything is fine.
If you have extra info that you think is vital, or found a good english language source, feel free to comment it below and i will edit it in!
Edit: thinking back to last year, i think there was the advise to move your phone away from ay edges they may trumble over while vibrating.
by SufficientMacaroon1
1 comment
>So yeah: if you hear sirens and your phone freaks out tomorrow at 11 am, keep calm. It is just a test, everything is fine.
Also: If you’re in a meeting around that time, either warn everyone else beforehand or don’t, depending on how much entertainment you’d like. I think tomorrow is my *third* time where I’m on a meeting where a few of us can observe on Zoom while an entire room full of people frantically hunts for their phones. Good entertainment.