The nationwide public warning system was activated on Wednesday as part of the Estonian Defense Forces' (EDF) training exercise "Hedgehog" ("Siil"). The test provided the Estonian Rescue Board, the Information System Authority (RIA) and other parties involved in crisis management, the opportunity to identify any potential issues should a genuine emergency occur.

As part of the pre-alert at 11 a.m., information was shared with the public via the "Eesti app," the "ERR Uudised app," err.ee, ETV and ETV+, as well as by SMS.

Due to technical issues, the pre-alert via the "Ole Valmis!" (I'm Prepared!") app was delayed significantly more than planned. The SMS notifications eventually reached an estimated 1.5 million devices, but such a large number of messages being sent at once meant that some recipients received them more than half an hour later than intended. Within the first 15 minutes, around 700,000 cell phones had received the SMS alert.

"Today's test highlighted several learning points. Some of them we anticipated, some of them we need to learn a bit more about. We ourselves are very glad that we have had these lessons before we are actually in a crisis," said Argo Kerb, head of the Rescue Board's communications department, at a press conference.

"Today, we tested the siren network, we tested the sending of SMS to an estimated one and a half million phones all over Estonia for the first time and we tested the emergency alert - the 'Ole Valmis!' app, the 'Eesti' app and in fact the ERR app as well. We also tested the national broadcasting channels, which broadcast the emergency alert: ETV, ETV+ and the ERR Uudised portal," Kerb said.

For the main alert phase at 3 p.m., the "Eesti app" and "Ole Valmis!" app sent out notifications. ETV, ETV+, err.ee, and the "ERR Uudised" app also delivered the test alerts. The SMS distribution followed a similar pattern to the morning pre-alert.

Delays were identified in the app notifications, which are currently being analyzed by the Information System Authority (RIA) and the Women's Voluntary Defense Organization (Naiskodukaitse).

As part of the main alert, the government also activated the siren network. In two thirds of the locations, the emergency sirens went off on time.

However, in most of the remaining areas, there were delays, and in a few places, the sirens failed to activate at all. The Ministry of the Interior's information technology and development center (SMIT) is currently compiling a more detailed overview. SMIT has begun analyzing the issues identified in the overall system.

According to Timmo Tammemäe from the Ministry of the Interior's IT and development center, there were also failures with the sirens, some of which went off with a delay, while others did not sound at all-

"We tested the siren network for the first time. At the moment, we can say that two thirds of the sirens went off very well, others had a slight delay and some did not go off at all. We are already investigating the cause of this and will have more precise details in the near future. While the testing was taking place, the volumes were also measured and these are the numbers that we will get from the analysis, which will be used as a basis for the further development of the siren network, which is planned for the coming years," said Tammemäe.

This first-time activation provided essential knowledge and experience of the current processes and communication channels.

The shortcomings identified will now be analyzed by the Ministry of the Interior, the Estonian Rescue Board, the Emergency Response Center, the Information System Authority, SMIT, and the Women's Voluntary Defense Organization.

The public are encouraged to provide feedback on their experience of the alert via the website kriis.ee/en.

This was the first test of the public warning system on such a wide scale, allowing an assessment of its performance in a real-life situation and helping to identify areas for improvement.

For more information, visit www.olevalmis.ee/en or call the national information line 1247.

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