9/11 was only regional in hindsight. At the time it was unfolding, we had no idea how many planes or targets were involved. In an unprecedented decision, all civilian aircraft in the entire country were grounded in a matter of hours. That certainly sounds like a situation where a national alert and broadcast could have been issued to warn the country what was happening or about to happen.

Because that large asteroid passed very, very close to the Earth yesterday, that certainly would be a reason for a national alert if it were actually on a collision course with the Earth.

You could have another multi-city terrorist attack, say, dirty bombs exploding sequentially in New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, and a threat from the terrorists that more are imminent.

You could be in the midst of a very bad, lethal pandemic or even a suspected bioterror attack in multiple sites across the country and the President orders all borders closed and all air travel to stop immediately in an effort to contain or slow the spread.

You could have another massive financial crisis which the government and the Fed aren't able to control and a real life "run" on the banks ensues eveywhere, so the President orders an immediate, nationwide "bank holiday".

Arguably, a "normal" nationwide broadcast could be used for any of these situations, but so could a nationwide EAS broadcast. Much of it may depend on the temperment of whoever is President at the time.

It was just this week that:

A - A large asteroid passed near the Earth.

B - The White House chose to deny any knowledge of ET contact with either people or the government.

And they pick now to do a nationwide test of the EAS?

I see black helicopters on the horizon (go to Fort Campbell, they are stationed there, dark grey really) and am prepping my aluminum hat as we speak. Do we think this is a coinkydink?

Let's keep the conspiracy theory stuff off of ETS.


chaosmagnet

Easy answer- how much of the media is now nationwide?

Cable and satellite are worthless if they only show their local emergencies- CNN is out of Atlanta, Fox News is from NYC, and MSNBC is... don't remember, NYC or LA. Either way, if those run ONLY their local emergency alerts, they are utterly worthless. Clear Channel Radio is just as bad, maybe even worse.

Now, would I use national for something like hurricane warning or a tornado watch? Generally, no.

I would use them for something like multiple attacks in several cities, or even just several serious attacks in one city, along with the advisory that watchers should tune to local media. A fast, 20-30 second beep and message at the top and bottom of the hour.

It isn't perfect, but what we have now is perfectly useless to reach the sizable portion of the population that just doesn't bother with network television. And of course, the national outlets I'm talking about seem to have all screwed it up.

*sighs* I keep telling myself the current state of affairs will be considered a good thing in three hundred years.