Remembering the Emergency Broadcast System

Today I'm pleased to welcome back Bill Griffiths, with another of his guest essays on television "back in the day." This week, in the first of a two-part series, he recalls something that used to unnerve the hell out of me when I was growing up: the weekly test of the Emergency Broadcast System. Remember? 

by Bill Griffiths

One of the wonders of the Internet has been the ability to remember and relive pleasant memories of the past. In particular, shared experiences of what television programs and events we watched, and may continue to watch in reruns, has come alive through different websites, blogs, podcasts and video sharing platforms such as YouTube, Dailymotion, Vimeo, TikTok and others. In our present day to day activities such diversions can offer moments of joy and comfort. Indeed it’s a reminder that no matter How events of the world may seem, life in general isn’t all too bad.

We all have fond memories of television in our youth. The shows, the personalities, the commercials and so much more. But for this guest essay and another to follow, I’ve gleefully chosen to turn negative and write about a couple of occurrences that decidedly do NOT inspire happy tv watching remembrances. One is the sudden interruption of a program for a news report. The other is the Emergency Broadcast System Test. The predecessor of today’s Emergency Alert System, EBS was in use between 1963 to 1997. It had replaced an earlier warning system called CONELRAD (1951-1963) that was designed to be activated specifically in the event of an enemy or nuclear attack. 

EBS was also designated for national and local civil defense emergencies, but additionally to communicate severe weather alerts. TV and radio stations were required to perform weekly on-air tests unless the system had been locally activated during the previous week. The tests were theoretically done at random times. But to this young Northern California viewer watching afternoon cartoons on KTVU Channel 2, they seemed to always be conducted during a program break. Thus the appearance of the Word TEST in big bold letters created brief unnecessary anxiety and a sudden urge to mute the set volume. However with maturity comes wisdom. Those EBS Tests were deliberately scheduled during the cartoon shows on Channel 2 so kids as myself knew what to expect “in the event of an emergency”. No doubt stations in other cities did the same thing.

The message generally went like this:

This is a test. For the next 60 seconds, this station will conduct a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. This is only a test.

[loud shrill tone is heard]

This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. The broadcasters of your area in voluntary cooperation with federal, state and local authorities, have developed this system to keep you informed in the event of an emergency. If this had been an actual emergency, the attention signal you just heard would have been followed by official information, news or instructions. This station serves the [insert name of your community] area. This concludes this test of the Emergency Broadcast System.

Then it was back to the cartoons and we were safe from the EBS Test for at least another week. That is, unless one turned over to another channel and who knew when any of them would perform their required weekly test?

Amazingly, I cannot recall one instance when the Emergency Broadcast System was actually used during my childhood. I don’t think it even occurred during the Loma Prieta Earthquake on October 17, 1989. Then again many stations were knocked off the air and when they came back on, it was straight to the developing news.

There was at least one instance when it was inadvertently activated and caused a brief panic. On the morning of Saturday, February 20, 1971 during what was at the time the standard weekly EBS test period, engineer Wayland S. Eberhardt in the National Emergency Warning Center at Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado sent out the wrong message code to radio and television stations indicating that a real national emergency was taking place. It took some 40 minutes for a firm correction to be issued. Some stations went into actual EBS mode while others did not. For his part Eberhardt was mortified by the whole incident, telling The New York Times, “I can’t imagine how the  hell I did it.” An investigation revealed the codes were in close proximity to one another and he simply grabbed the wrong one. Tests soon became more randomized. A recording of how radio station WOWO-AM in Fort Wayne, Indiana managed the “emergency” is preserved in a 5-minute excerpt on YouTube, that starts with a lead-in

from DJ Bob Sievers to the then-new Partridge Family song “Doesn’t Somebody Want To Be Wanted”. It’s still unnerving to hear, but Sievers handles the situation professionally.

The announcements concerning the EBS Tests were fairly straight-forward. The wording could be customized to better reflect the area it was being broadcast. But in general, EBS was serious business and you couldn’t mess around with serious messaging. Those lines can’t be made into upbeat music, right? Ah, but it was and more than once. Around 1974 radio jingle company TM Productions created a rather entertaining song directly from the EBS Test script. A couple of other jingle organizations produced amusing variations on these announcements which can also be heard on YouTube. There is even one that even extends into the tone itself where it sounds like the rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb” with a quacking duck at the end of the announcement—a subtle nod to the infamous “Duck and Cover” film of the 1950’s! These examples would certainly have made the ordeal of sitting through tests a lot more fun. However, the fine folks at the FCC were not amused and created a rule that mandated EBS Tests not be sung or joked about in any way. “The TM Rule” remains in effect to this day.

Regular test notifications of the Emergency Broadcast System much like the current Emergency Alert System are just part of the normal TV viewing experience. I’m sure many of you have EBS memories whether it be sitting through an angst-ridden test moment or an actual emergency where it was activated in your area.

For something more jarring, little else can beat a program being unexpectedly interrupted for breaking news. That will be the subject for an upcoming guest essay. In the meantime, I’ll conclude for now with three of the most dreaded words in television…

TO BE CONTINUED  TV