Sirens, emergency phone alerts and shelters: what they mean and what to do

War in Europe, drones crossing borders, more frequent extreme weather and national tests of emergency alerts on everyone’s phone have made many people wonder, for the first time, what sirens mean and where they should go. The answers are simple, but worth learning now, not when the alarm sounds.

Alerts on your phone

Most countries in Europe and North America now have a system that sends warnings directly to every phone in an affected area: floods, storms, extreme heat, big fires, chemical incidents, air threats or missing children. The country box above shows what yours is called.

• Don’t turn alerts off in your phone settings (on Android and iPhone look for “Emergency alerts” or “Wireless emergency alerts”).
• Read the whole message. It says what happened, where and what to do.
• Don’t reply to messages that claim to be official alerts and ask for personal data or a click on a link: real alert systems never do.

Sirens

Outdoor sirens are still used in many countries, especially for air raids, industrial accidents, dam failures and tsunamis. Each country has its own patterns. Typically:

• a rising and falling (wailing) tone means immediate danger: take shelter;
• a steady continuous tone often means the all-clear, or, in some countries, a different type of danger;
• regular test days (often the first Wednesday or first Monday of the month at a set time) let people hear the signals without acting.

Because the patterns differ, check your national civil protection website (linked in the country box) and learn what each signal means where you live and where you travel.

If you hear a siren and don’t know what it means: go inside, close doors and windows, turn on the radio or TV and check your phone for official alerts.

Shelters

Some countries have extensive public shelter networks (Switzerland, Finland, Sweden, Israel, and many in Central and Eastern Europe dating from the Cold War); others have very few and advise sheltering in place.

What to do now:

• Find out whether your country publishes a shelter map and locate the nearest one to your home, work and the children’s school.
• Ask your building management whether the building has a shelter and what state it’s in.
• Agree with your family where you’ll go if an air raid alarm sounds.

If you can’t reach a shelter within a few minutes, choose the safest place in your building: the basement, an interior room without windows or the stairwell, away from glass. Avoid the top floors.

What to take to a shelter

If you’ve prepared a 72-hour emergency kit, take that. If not, the minimum:

• water and something to eat;
• your daily medicines;
• phone, power bank and a small radio;
• a flashlight;
• ID documents;
• warm clothes and a blanket;
• for children, something comforting.

When it’s a test

Authorities announce siren and phone alert tests a few days ahead. You don’t need to do anything during a test. Use the moment to check: do you know what each signal sounds like? Do you know where you’d go?