FLORIDA — An emergency alert test that woke many Floridians up at around 4:45 a.m. on Thursday was sent out by mistake, the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM) said in a tweet.
Numerous people complained on social media about the alert abruptly waking them up.
FDEM issued an apology, explaining that the alert was supposed to be on TV and not disturb anyone already sleeping.
“We are taking the appropriate action to ensure this will never happen again and that only true emergencies are sent as alerts in the middle of the night,” FDEM said.
We are taking the appropriate action to ensure this will never happen again and that only true emergencies are sent as alerts in the middle of the night.
— FL Division of Emergency Management (@FLSERT) April 20, 2023
Officials with the U.S. National Weather Service are reminding people that though this test was sent in error, they are urging the public not to turn off emergency alerts, as doing so can prevent receiving critical information in the event of an emergency.
“We STRONGLY discourage individuals from deactivating these alerts. Deactivating alerts can prevent people from receiving critical, life-saving weather warnings from the National Weather Service. These weather warnings can often occur when people are sleeping. A NOAA Weather Radio is also recommended as another source of these weather warnings.”
Gov. Ron DeSantis issued the following statement on Twitter following the alert test mistake:
I’ve ordered FL Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie to bring swift accountability for the test of the emergency alert system in the wee hours of the morning. This was a completely inappropriate use of this system.
Stay tuned.
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) April 20, 2023
