19
WEATHER RADIO
ABOUT THE NATIONAL WEATHER RADIO SYSTEM
The National Weather Service (
NWS
) is a government agency within the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (
NOAA
) that operates the nationwide radio
network known as NOAA Weather Radio (
NWR
). NWR is a nationwide radio stations
network continuously broadcasting information about all types of hazardous events both
environmental and technological. NWR works with the Federal Communications
Commission’s (
FCC
) Emergency Alert System (
EAS
), and considered to be a single
source of all weather and emergency information.
As a nationwide network, the NWR consists of more than 940 transmitters in all 50 US
states, adjacent coastal waters, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands and US Pacific
Territories. This network also includes a Weatheradio Canada which is a part of
Meteorological Service of Canada (
MSC
).
Routine broadcast consisting of local weather forecast, regional conditions and marine
forecasts is repeated every few minutes. During emergencies, routine broadcasts are
interrupted to report specific warnings.
When the NWR broadcasts specific warning, a digital code of
Specific Area Message
Encoding
(
SAME
) is included as part of the message. The SAME code consists of
specific information containing the geographical area affected, the expiration time of the
message and the message itself.
Your
Weather Radio
has been designed to receive and decode warning, watch or
non-emergency messages that are broadcast in digital SAME code by the National
Weather service. A SAME broadcast will be heard as very brief tone burst resembling
chirps. Once received, the message will be presented visually and by voice
announcement. The SAME code contains the type of message, county(s) affected, and
message expiration time. Your radio should provide reception for up to 40 miles distant
from the NWR transmitter depending on terrain and man made structures, either of which
can reduce that distance.
To receive SAME messages about events occurring only in your specific area you can
use the
FIPS
(Federal Information Processing Standard) codes and program up to nine
(9) specific locations. The FIPS codes you have entered will be automatically saved into
the radio memory.
NOTE: For customizing your Weather Radio use the Weather Radio Control Panel
buttons located on the front of the main unit.
CUSTOMIZING YOUR WEATHER RADIO
Weather Radio
allows selecting and programming of several different features, including
the weather radio channel, country, language of the events (alerts), alerts, location, signal
reminder and alert mode.
20
CHANNEL SEARCH
There are two options available for searching of NWR channels – an
auto
and
manual
.
The default channel search mode is
auto
.
If an
auto search
is
selected, leave the
Weather Radio
in the default mode after the
main unit has been powered. Then the
Weather Radio
will scan automatically through all
7 NOAA frequencies (channels) and lock on the strongest available channel.
When an
auto search
is selected and reception is successful, the
Weather Radio
will
display the number of the received channel (for example:
CHANNEL 7
).
If no channel is detected at this time, the message
NO
CHANNEL AVAILABLE BACK
TO CHANNEL X
will be displayed.
If a
manual search
is selected, follow this programming procedure:
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
button until message
MANUAL
is displayed
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
once entering into the channel search programming
mode – a channel number will be displayed
•
Press
▲
or
▼
adjusting the desired channel number - 1 through 7
•
Press
WEATHER/SNOOZE
button on the main unit to listen a NWR
broadcast – the icon
NOAA
will be displayed next to the reception status icon
•
Press
◄
to exit
NOTE
:
If your Weather Radio is receiving a NWR broadcast on more than one
channel, the one with the best reception may not be the best option for your
location. Contact NWS for information regarding broadcasting stations locations.
To contact the NWS by telephone, dial 1-888-NWR-SAME (1-888-697-7263)
To obtain NWS radio channels and SAME codes on Internet:
www.nws.noaa.gov/nwr/indexnw.htm
COUNTRY SELECTION
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
button entering into the programming mode until
SELECT CH
message is displayed
•
Press
▲
button until the
SET COUNTRY
message is displayed
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
button entering into the country programming mode
•
Press
▲
or
▼
selecting
US
or
Canada
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
button to confirm – the unit will beep once confirming
the country selection
•
Press
◄
to exit
LANGUAGE SELECTION
•
Press
MENU/SELECT
button entering into the programming mode until
SELECT CH
message is displayed
•
Press
▲
or
▼
buttons until the
SET LANGUAGE
message is displayed
