§  11.55   EAS operation during a State or Local Area emergency.

   (a) The EAS may be activated at the State and Local Area levels by EAS
   Participants at their discretion for day-to-day emergency situations
   posing a threat to life and property. Examples of natural emergencies
   which may warrant state EAS activation are: Tornadoes, floods,
   hurricanes, earthquakes, heavy snows, icing conditions, widespread
   fires, etc. Man-made emergencies warranting state EAS activation may
   include: Toxic gas leaks or liquid spills, widespread power failures,
   industrial explosions, and civil disorders.

   (1) DBS providers shall pass through all EAS messages aired on local
   television broadcast stations carried by DBS providers under the
   Commission's broadcast signal carriage rules to subscribers receiving
   those channels.

   (2) SDARS licensees and DBS providers may participate in EAS at the
   state and local level and make their systems capable of receiving and
   transmitting state and local level EAS messages on all channels. If an
   SDARS licensee or DBS provider is not capable of receiving and
   transmitting state and local EAS message on all channels, it must
   inform its subscribers, on its website and in writing on an annual
   basis, of which channels are and are not capable of supplying state and
   local messages.

   (b) EAS operations must be conducted as specified in State and Local
   Area EAS Plans.

   (c) Immediately upon receipt of a State or Local Area EAS message that
   has been formatted in the EAS Protocol or the Common Alerting Protocol,
   EAS Participants participating in the State or Local Area EAS must do
   the following:

   (1) State Relays (SR) monitor or deliver EAS alerts as required by the
   State EAS Plan.

   (2) Local Primary (LP) entities monitor SPs, SRs, or other sources as
   set forth in the State EAS Plan.

   (3) Participating National (PN) sources monitor LPs or other sources as
   set forth in the State EAS Plan.

   (4) EAS Participants participating in the State or Local Area EAS must
   discontinue normal programming and follow the procedures in the State
   and Local Area Plans. Analog and digital television broadcast stations
   must transmit all EAS announcements visually and aurally as specified
   in § 11.51(a) through (e) and 73.1250(h) of this chapter, as applicable;
   analog cable systems, digital cable systems, and wireless cable systems
   must transmit all EAS announcements visually and aurally as specified
   in § 11.51(g) and (h); and DBS providers must transmit all EAS
   announcements visually and aurally as specified in § 11.51(j). EAS
   Participants providing foreign language programming should transmit all
   EAS announcements in the same language as the primary language of the
   EAS Participant.

   (5) Upon completion of the State or Local Area EAS transmission
   procedures, resume normal programming until receipt of the cue from the
   SR or LP sources in your Local Area. At that time begin transmitting
   the common emergency message received from the above sources.

   (6) Resume normal operations upon conclusion of the message.

   (7) The times of the above EAS actions must be entered in the EAS
   Participants' records as specified in § § 11.35(a) and 11.54(a)(3).

   (8) Use of the EAS codes or Attention Signal automatically grants
   rebroadcast authority as specified in § 11.54(b).

   (d) Immediately upon receipt of a State or Local Area EAS message that
   has been formatted in the Common Alerting Protocol, EAS Participants
   must do the following:

   (1) EAS Participants participating in the State or Local Area EAS must
   follow the procedures for processing such messages in the State and
   Local Area Plans.

   (2) Analog and digital television broadcast stations must transmit all
   EAS announcements visually and aurally as specified in § 11.51(a)
   through (e) and 73.1250(h) of this chapter, as applicable; analog cable
   systems, digital cable systems, and wireless cable systems must
   transmit all EAS announcements visually and aurally as specified in
   § 11.51(g) and (h); and DBS providers must transmit all EAS
   announcements visually and aurally as specified in § 11.51(j). EAS
   Participants providing foreign language programming should transmit all
   EAS announcements in the same language as the primary language of the
   EAS Participant.

   (3) Resume normal operations upon conclusion of the message.

   (4) The times of the above EAS actions must be entered in the EAS
   Participants' records as specified in § § 11.35(a) and 11.54(a)(3).

   [ 59 FR 67092 , Dec. 28, 1994, as amended at  63 FR 29666 , June 1, 1998;
    65 FR 21658 , Apr. 24, 2000;  67 FR 18511 , Apr. 16, 2002;  70 FR 71037 ,
   Nov. 25, 2005;  71 FR 76220 , Dec. 20, 2006;  72 FR 62135 , Nov. 2, 2007;
    77 FR 16706 , Mar. 22, 2012;  83 FR 37759 , Aug. 2, 2018]