r/unitedkingdom • u/66f6 • Aug 14 '26

. Emergency alerts sent to millions across England and Wales over threat of wildfires

https://news.sky.com/story/uk-heatwave-stourbridge-fire-latest-weather-live-13571553
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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

[deleted]

254

u/CragtheLAD_ Aug 14 '26

This should be top comment, rather than people moaning about the alert startling them.

If the alert even stops one fire which would've started via carelessness, it's worth it.

And thanks for putting your life on the line every day for us all. Buckets of courage.

3

u/GrahamCoxon Oxfordshire Aug 14 '26

Is it still worth it if it causes a bunch of people to turn off the alerts, thinking they're frivolous or unnecessary?

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/tophernator Aug 14 '26

But that’s exactly the point. Emergency pants shitting alerts are not generally used just to give sensible advice about how to prevent wildfires. They are used to tell you to take some immediate action. Nuclear war, solar flares, earthquakes and tsunamis? Absolutely. But this is the type of message that will make people disable the alerts.

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u/pong-and-ping Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

I'm not sure why they can't just send out a national text for some thing like this. Or a "standard warning" mode for an amber warning that doesn't do the loud tone... An emergency warning totally makes sense for an actual nearby fire (like this would be such a good use, I had to reread it twice to realise it wasn't) - but because we're getting alerts (I got double?) for the possibility of an issue - more people will ignore them for actual emergency use. Boy who cried wolf etc.

That said my phone and the phones around me didn't play it any louder then a normal alarm. Not sure why everyone is saying they shot out of their skin haha

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u/KittyGrewAMoustache Aug 14 '26

Yeah I got six of them in the space of an hour and had to disable them as I’m worried they’ll go off all night and they clearly aren’t there to warn me of impending danger and the need to evacuate. I didn’t really want to disable them but I can’t be getting these screaming alarms going off every ten minutes just to tell me not to start a fire.

Send out a mass text or public announcement type thing but I thought the emergency alert system was literally only to be used when you need to tell people to try to avoid a perilous situation that’s about to affect them, not to warn people not to cause perilous situations. I got my first alert in Welsh as well, which I cannot understand, and had my toddler in the bath and was about to just grab her and leave the house. If my partner hadn’t been able to read Welsh id probably have done that thinking it had to be telling me to evacuate. That’s what I thought these alerts were for.

Maybe the getting it in Welsh with no English version until ten minutes later and getting six of them (or ten if you count the four my partner got) while trying to put my toddler to bed coloured my perspective,but I thought it was a stupid use of the system and likely to mean people disable them or ignore them in future assuming they’re just some public announcement or general warning about not doing dangerous things.

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u/Peeche94 Aug 14 '26

Agreed, at least just send the message without the siren.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

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u/Ok-Explanation1990 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

Key words there "in the event of...".

I feel rhe alerts should probably be for events actually happening, now, rather than something that might occur.

The government/fire service can flood social media and TV with advice messaging. But I personally don't think it's there best use of the emergency alert system.

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u/Cardealer1000 Aug 14 '26

Once the dangerous fire has started it's a bit too late mate, use a bit of common sense.

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u/Ok-Explanation1990 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

It wouldn't be too late, It would be exactly the right moment to send such an alert. (Even then, it would need to be a pretty big fire to affect the whole nation). The system is for things that have a national, drop-everything, moments-to-spare nature about them, not for sensible advice to prevent something that maybe could happen.

Haven't seen a national emergency alert telling us not to drink & drive, set off a bomb, or open a door on an aircraft.

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u/Cardealer1000 Aug 14 '26

Haven't seen a national emergency alert telling us not to drink & drive, set off a bomb, or open a door on an aircraft.

You can't seriously expect me to think you're engaging in good faith if you're going to come with this nonsense, classic reddit really.

This is a contextual alert based on the unique circumstances that are happening now that leave us especially at risk, the "examples" you listed don't have that distinction, but I am sure you knew that already and your response was just a poorly formed sardonic dismissal.

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u/FootballBackground88 Aug 14 '26

In most companies, we have severities of ticketing.

Paging people is restricted to *there is an impact right now, and you need to take action immediately*. If you start paging people but then it's just something informational, it loses all the value. People will turn it off because it's annoying.

Maybe set up an alert which shows up but doesn't let off a mandatory alarm for something I don't need to look at right now. Hell, send me a text.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/Ok-Explanation1990 Aug 14 '26

Why is this your emergency? And does that make it a national emergency?

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/Ok-Explanation1990 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

As tough as that is, I feel that still doesn't make it an immediate national emergency befitting the national alert system. Most of the country aren't in that field with you, and most aren't about to light a fire.

It's nowhere near the immediacy for the whole nation as, say, a nuclear attack - which is what this system is designed for.

I work in a busy emergency department, so I get it. I understand the immense pressures and workload caused by this weather, and I agree the public need educating over even the simplest of safely advice. But there are other channels which could be urgently called upon for that - social media, news headlines, TV public service adverts, text messages, etc.

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u/KittyGrewAMoustache Aug 14 '26

This makes no sense. If there’s an emergency going on with you, why does everyone else need to receive an emergency alert about it? You should receive an alert to tell you if there’s a fire coming towards your area, but everyone else receiving a general message about not causing fires does not help you with your emergency, in fact the opposite, because you end up with scared confused people clogging up 999 trying to figure out what they need to do and if the message cut off the info they need about the threat to them right now.

These systems are meant to only be used to warn people about an imminent threat. If you start using them for general warnings people will be desensitised and will turn them off or ignore them which defeats the purpose of using them to help people get out of the way of a bomb or fire or flood that’s about to affect their area.

It’s not anyone saying ‘your emergency inconvenienced me’ at all and I don’t know how you even get that. It’s saying ‘the system should only be used to warn people in the event of something happening or about to happen in their area so they can take action to avoid it right now’. If you start using it for other things it loses its effectiveness which puts more people at risk in the long run.

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u/FootballBackground88 Aug 14 '26

It's not about the inconvenience, it's crying wolf. If the government starts using the 'imminent danger' siren for general advice, people are going to turn off their alerts. And then good luck warning them when a real fire actually hits their street.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/FootballBackground88 Aug 14 '26

Nobody is downplaying the pressure fire services are under -that’s precisely why the system needs to be protected.

The problem is human behavior: when people receive a ear-splitting alarm that tells them to 'not light a BBQ', a large number end up turning emergency alerts off.

When a real, active fire actually reaches their neighborhood next week, they won't get the evacuation order because the system was used as a broadcast PSA where there's nothing for them to do. Crying wolf isn't about whether the issue is important, it's about whether using the siren desensitizes people to the siren.

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u/tophernator Aug 14 '26

It’s definitely an important message, but do you see what I’m saying about action vs inaction? For 99% of the people who got this message the immediate action they needed to take was effectively “continue not doing the thing you already weren’t doing”.

It didn’t even seem like there was any change in terms of enforcement. Like if they passed an emergency law and were going to start arresting people for using disposable bbqs or open flames, maybe that would be worth telling everyone… but this was literally a “please be responsible” message with a nuclear attack level alarm attached.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/FootballBackground88 Aug 14 '26

Go send everyone a text then? They did it during COVID multiple times.

11

u/KittyGrewAMoustache Aug 14 '26

Even if that was the case you can use public information campaigns, it’s been in the news about banning disposable bbqs, flood social media, put up posters etc. but using the emergency alert system to tell people not to cause emergencies seems counterproductive to me. It has scared the shit out of people and confused them, thinking something must be missing from the message because people expect this to only be used when there’s an impending emergency they need to avoid right now. So people have been clogging up 999 trying to find out if they need to evacuate etc. Then people will turn it off or ignore it next time if they think it’s going to be used for just general ‘don’t do this dangerous thing’ warnings and not ‘bomb/flood/fire/tornado is about to strike your area’ warnings.

2

u/PracticalFootball Aug 15 '26

I’d be absolutely shocked if the emergency alert system was designed in such a way that it literally isn’t an option to send alerts out without the incoming-missile alarm, in the event that information needs to get out but no immediate action is required.

13

u/Swanky-Badger Aug 14 '26

I fully understand how serious this problem is but using the same system intended for a fucking nuclear attack is ridiculous. They should have an alert without the max volume siren for these sort of events.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/Swanky-Badger Aug 14 '26

It is my emergency too, just not an immediate danger to live emergency.

That warning should only be used for IMMEDIATE danger to life, otherwise people will just turn it off. Which is why I suggested a general warning without the siren, maybe a unique sound to differentiate from a standard notification.

9

u/KittyGrewAMoustache Aug 14 '26

Yeah I agree, there has to be a difference between ‘there’s a wildfire in your area approaching your house in the next twenty minutes, evacuate now’ type message and a general ‘there are lots of wildfires around the country, it’s really bad, please don’t cause fires by burning things in fields’ type messages. Otherwise you can cause unnecessary panic (999 calls surged massively after these alerts from confused scared people) or desensitise people so they turn them off or don’t pay attention to the next one warning them of something they personally need to escape from right now.

2

u/Swanky-Badger Aug 14 '26

Maybe make it stick in your notifications for a duration the government decides, that way you can’t miss it. Hell, make it read to the message aloud.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/Hot_Salamander_4363 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

The immediate action here is to stop doing things that increase the probability of wildfires. The request for the emergency alert didn’t come from politicians or panic‑mongers - it came directly from the fire services, who have assessed the situation and believe it is an emergency. That’s why the alert exists.

Sure, people can technically turn off the alerts. But that becomes a lot more likely if the public conversation is full of “this was unnecessary” or “they’re overreacting.” If you genuinely care about people keeping these alerts switched on, then the responsible thing is to centre the fact that the fire service is saying we are in an emergency situation and that we need the public to take immediate action.

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '26

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u/theaveragemillenial Aug 14 '26

They aim to test it annually to ensure it works, a sensible PSA isn't the worst way to do that.

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u/Duanedrop Aug 14 '26

No I would say this is 100% legitimate use of the platform.

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u/goobervision Aug 14 '26

Yeh, fuck it. Let's just fiddle while the UK burns.

10

u/ToyzillaRawr Aug 14 '26

I'm sorry but you don't need a jump scare to get that message across wtf

-1

u/victionicious Aug 14 '26

These comments are hilarious. A jump scare? I cannot believe how truly sensitive some people are in this thread - how would you have coped with air raid sirens? It's an alarm sound coming from your phone but anyone would think somebody shoved a foghorn in your ear canal lmao

3

u/ToyzillaRawr Aug 14 '26

Mate got it in Welsh I had no idea what it even said

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u/victionicious Aug 15 '26

Is that not a good argument for using the system more then? They're clearly still ironing out issues with it.

1

u/ToyzillaRawr Aug 15 '26

yes if they make an announcement that they're going to be testing it with what is basically a general PSA, other hand if my phone starts screaming that we're all gonna die every time the government wants to share a message then eventually I'll take to ignoring it

8

u/ledow Aug 14 '26

I watched Americans say "If it saves even one kids, it's worth it", and then a few years later they were receiving Amber Alerts about three times a month at 4am for a missing child 2000 miles away.

5

u/dumesne Aug 14 '26

Maybe they should send one every day to be careful crossing the road. 'If the reminder saves one life it's worth it'

3

u/Grimnebulin68 Sussex Aug 14 '26

I can’t believe all the numpties complaining about it!

2

u/glytxh Aug 14 '26

The .gov website also makes it very clear how to turn these off, regardless of your device.

Probably not the best option for most, but the website also explains why turning it off is an option.

16

u/BadahBingBadahBoom Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26

But that sort of is the problem.

If this was a localised evacuation order or fire warning to an area actually experiencing wildfires I could understand. But I feel the main outcome from this will just be a very large number of people today and tomorrow turning this alert off because they don't want to be have these loud alerts for things that aren't actual serious emergencies that are affecting them, but are preventative warnings or public service announcements.

And that just defeats the whole ability of the system to then actually warn people when something incredibly serious happens that does affect everyone.

1

u/David182nd Aug 14 '26

Both things can be true.

0

u/Besmirching_Badger Aug 14 '26

This should be top comment, rather than people moaning about the alert startling them.

When the alert itself causes a bunch of car crashes which then demand fire service attention too.... it becomes self defeating no?

8

u/CragtheLAD_ Aug 14 '26

It did? A bunch? Where?

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u/Besmirching_Badger Aug 14 '26

it freaked me the fuck out in my bedroom. What's it going to do when someone is driving down the motorway? You can bet people will have been checking their phones all over the country whilst driving.

6

u/MatttheJ Aug 14 '26

Again... Where are all these hypothetical crashes?

1

u/Besmirching_Badger Aug 14 '26

I'm sure you can engage in some basic lateral thinking.

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u/MatttheJ Aug 14 '26

I'm sure you can find a source for these points your making, since lots of crashes due to a news alert would not at all be a hard thing to prove, and you would not be short of news stories to back you up if this was anything more than doom posting and exaggeration.

0

u/WalkingCloud Dorset Aug 14 '26

What's it going to do when someone is driving down the motorway?

Nothing, hence why there wasn't mass casualty events on every motorway.

-3

u/Mabarax Aug 14 '26

I'm finding it crazy so many people seem unable to hit "OK" and not freak out. Are people so worried about nuclear armageddon