At the Catalonia Operational Coordination Center (CECAT), the team, which is always made up of at least one technician and two operators, has been under pressure for almost a week. Last Thursday, the DANA that hit the center of the Valencian Community moved north, towards Castelló, then hit Terres de l’Ebre. During these five days, the Civil Protection of Catalonia had to respond to the most dangerous storm in years, but this time it had a new weapon that proved essential: the warning the population via cell phone.
“It’s a very useful tool, especially when you’re looking for immediacy. In a few seconds, we can reach a very high percentage of people in the territory who are under threat,” explains the deputy operational director of Civil Protection, Imma Solé.
According to this official, the ES-Alert system, which uses technology implemented at European level, has made it possible to take a giant step forward in directly informing citizens, because it makes it possible to generalize immediate alerts which until now were only possible at the local level. very precise points, thanks to systems such as light signals or sirens.
Thursday noon, shortly before 1:30 p.m., CECAT sends its first messagelocated in the Terres de l’Ebre region, in the south of Catalonia. The text was clear: non-essential mobility was restricted in three specific regions, Baix Ebre, Montsià and Terra Alta. Since and until Monday, a total of ten messages have been sent, each with a different scope. The latest ones, this Monday, caused millions of cell phones to start ringing at the same time.
“The alert strategy is that when it is necessary, the population has information and acts accordingly. It’s a call to the population to do something, which almost always involves taking self-protective measures, such as self-isolation,” Solé explains.
The difficult balance between failing and overcoming
Even if each message only reached part of the population, the Generalitat has never sent ten messages in just five days. Civil Protection, however, warns that this does not mean that mobile alerts will become widespread.
“What happened this week is something very exceptional. It was not a normal autumn rain, but a DANA with very particular characteristics as we unfortunately saw in Valencia. These are the characteristics that have made us very preventative,” says Solé, who indicates that he is fully aware of the risks that misuse of this tool can entail.
Sonia Andolz, security expert and former director of the Government Security Administration, recalls that in Catalonia the ES-Alert system was set up mainly to respond to situations of chemical or nuclear risk, very localized in the province. from Tarragona. “But once put in place, it’s a fantastic tool in any crisis that requires rapid responses,” says Andolz.
“The challenge is to inform without alarming and without abusing the mechanism so that people do not stop paying attention to it,” believes the expert, who takes the example of anti-terrorism alerts. “If you send a message at a specific time, people pay attention and respond, but if you remind yourself every day that you are at anti-terrorism level four, it becomes a habit and stops having an effect,” explains -he.
The problem of people getting used to it and ignoring it arises not only with mobile messages, but also with any emergency alert. “It’s that saying: ‘The wolf is coming!’ You have to be credible and responsible,” explains Solé, who gives the example of fire campaigns: “During the summer, two warnings are generally issued to avoid travel due to the risk of fire. Sometimes the danger would require throwing more, but we know that when faced with two, people pay a lot of attention, but the more they start to diminish the effectiveness.”
The techniques suggest, the advisor approves
Although we sometimes speak of “alert SMS”, in reality the notifications sent by CECAT, like the rest of the autonomous governments, use a technology that has nothing to do with the usual text message and which has been implemented by a European directive. in 2018. “But while in countries like France or Germany they were already in force, in Spain they were not fully deployed, and Catalonia made great efforts to do so because we had a historic demand for certain territories,” explains Andolz.
Finally, with the technology already implemented and the majority of successful tests in recent years, it is now the technicians who know the platform and its possibilities better.
“What we see is a platform that allows us to develop messages. We do them in Catalan, Spanish and English,” summarizes the head of Civil Protection operations, Cristina Vicente. “Then we have to choose where it is sent. We can select an entire municipality, an entire region or we can also select specific antennas, or draw an area,” he explains.
Now, as Vicente remembers, for the message to reach a mobile Android 11 or higher, or IOS 15 or higher, this You must have this type of alerts enabled. It is also necessary to have coverage from your carrier.
When a threat occurs, technicians are the first to detect it, thanks to the different input channels available to CECAT, from weather service alerts to local warnings. Once the incident is noticed, it is escalated through the command structure to the operations manager, assistant manager, or both, and even other managers. These are all those who, once the situation has been assessed, design and propose a series of actions. These may include sending messages via ES-Alert.
But ultimately, nothing is implemented without the yes of the Minister of the Interior, in this case Núria Parlon, or the head of the Department. In other words, all messages end up being approved by the advisor or, failing that, by a political official. In addition, a few minutes before they are sent, local authorities are informed so that they are prepared and coordinated.
Although the Civil Protection of Catalonia’s commitment to mobile messages is firm, they also emphasize the importance of other channels, such as traditional media or social networks. And they warn that not seeing an alert on your mobile does not mean that you should not take steps to avoid risks, especially in new scenarios. “Climate change poses many challenges for us because it produces very sudden and unexpected situations,” concludes Solé.
