Free service in Bibb and Houston could save lives in a tornado, but many don’t use it

When a tornado warning went out for Bibb County on Sunday, a local alert went out to 6,100 phones, but Spencer Hawkins wants it to be a lot more than that.

He is the county’s emergency management director. He isn’t sure how many cell phones and landlines there are in the county, but the population is about 152,000, and just about everyone has a cellphone these days. That’s also not counting that many people work or travel in Bibb but live elsewhere.

“If you live, work or play in Bibb County, you should be signed up for the alerts,” Hawkins said.

The phone alert system is more effective than the siren system, he said, and it’s free. People may not hear the siren when they are indoors or not close enough, but everyone keeps their phone with them, Hawkins said.

“The biggest thing is to be aware,” Hawkins said. “We can get them that warning early.”

People can sign up for the alerts, called MBCAlert, by going to the EMA website at maconbibb.us/ema/. Hawkins said a marketing campaign is being planned to get more people signed up. The alerts, which include voice and text messages, can go to cell phones or landlines.

Despite the low number signed up for the local alert service, many people with cell phones probably did get the alert through the National Weather Service, Hawkins said. But the local message, he said, is more detailed and gives more updates. For example, those signed up for the local alerts got a message that the warning Sunday had been extended, he said, but that message did not go out on other phones.

Houston County has a similar alert system called Code Red. People can sign up for it at the county’s website, houstoncountyga.,org. Chris Stoner, assistant EMA director in Houston County, said the system has worked well, but there were some complaints Sunday that the alerts were delayed. He suspects it could have to do with certain cellphone carriers and said he is looking into it. But overall he said people are pleased with the system, which has also been used to send out alerts to targeted areas such as when a child is missing.

“I think it’s pretty effective,” he said. “We’ve gotten very good response to that system.”

In Houston, Stoner said 71,650 phones are registered with Code Red, but only 12,204 are signed up to get automated weather alerts. People registered would get manual alerts such as those for a missing person in targeted areas, but weather alerts are listed as an option in the signup. Stoner said he isn’t sure why more people aren’t signing up for the weather alerts.

Riley Land, the deputy EMA director for Muscogee County, said Columbus residents can sign up for a phone alert system called CivicReady through the city’s website columbusga.gov. He wasn’t sure how many people are signed up for it, but he said the system is better suited for alerts such as closed roads than tornado warnings. He said when alerts are needed immediately, people may be able to get those quicker through a weather radio or weather phone app than a phone alert, which can have human and technological delays.