Attorney General Letitia James is pressing the National Weather Service (NWS) to expand its wireless emergency alerts (WEAs) to include severe winter weather warnings for residents.
Presently, the NWS issues these regionalized WEAs for various extreme weather conditions, but severe winter storms, such as blizzards and ice events, are notably absent.
This call to action follows a devastating storm in Western New York last December, which resulted in 47 fatalities. “A wireless emergency alert can be the difference between life and death,” remarked James. Beyond this, the attorney general is also advocating for an in-depth review of the NWS’s communication methods, specifically highlighting last year’s calamitous storm in Buffalo.
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