There is one very critical service the Federal Government does and does well. Its the National Weather Service known as NWS
24/7 - 365 They maintain VHF Radio Transmitters which signal and turn on Emergency Weather Radios
Across the country.
These Radios are vital to warn of impending Severe Weather Conditions such as Tornadoes and Severe Thunder Storms etc.
Unfortunately the Signal on 162.550 put out by the National Weather Service which covers
The Pittsburgh Pa and surrounding County's and parts of WV and Ohio
Went out of service on April 12, 2022 due to Verizon discontinuing private in band phone lines service
NOAA's National Weather Service
NWSChat
NWSChat

742
NOUS41 KPBZ 121923
PNSPBZ
OHZ041-PAZ013-014-020>023-029-031-073>076-WVZ001>004-130730-
PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PITTSBURGH PA
323 PM EDT TUE APR 12 2022
...PITTSBURGH NWR TRANSMITTER...
AUDIO FROM THE NOAA WEATHER RADIO STATION KIH35 BROADCASTING FROM
PITTSBURGH ON 162.550 MHZ REMAINS IN A DEGRADED STATE UNTIL PHONE
CIRCUITS AND AUDIO EQUIPMENT CAN BE UPGRADED. TEMPORARY FULL OFF
THE AIR TIME IS EXPECTED IN THE NEAR FUTURE AS THIS EQUIPMENT IS
UPGRADED. ESTIMATED TIME FOR COMPLETION IS UNKNOWN.
SURROUNDING NOAA WEATHER RADIO SITES THAT COVER THE AFFECTED
REGION INCLUDE:
BRIDGEPORT, OH WWF35 - 162.525 MHZ
MORGANTOWN, OH KWN35 - 162.475 MHZ
JOHNSTOWN, PA WXM33 - 162.400 MHZ
PARKER, PA WWG53 - 162.425 MHZ
REYNOLDSVILLE, PA KZZ42 - 162.500 MHZ
YOUNGSTOWN, OH WWG56 - 162.500 MHZ
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.WEATHER.GOV/PBZ/RADIO.
LISTENERS ARE ALSO ENCOURAGED TO MAKE SURE WIRELESS EMERGENCY
ALERTS (WEA) ARE ENABLED ON CELLULAR DEVICES.
$$
.This is a very bad situation for those who depend on these radios in homes and businesses
Like mine who may not have a TV or Radio on or have poor or no Cellular Service .
All Too often Verizon , AT&T and T Mobile fail to send out the messages . The radio 100% of the time works
and now that Analog TV 1 and 2 radio bands no longer work on multi band radios it also cuts out many rural people who need this service.and depend on weather radios.
where they use to at least be able to listen to TV newscasts when they could not get video.
This is also causing Issues for Radio and TV stations who monitor the Weather Radio Alerts to trip their EAS alert monitors so messages get delivered.
KDKA 1020 AM which is the main re-transmission point for NWS in Pittsburgh to all other stations never got notified to problem and only after contacting NWS was able to establish a IP link using the EMnet system Pa set up but not all stations have EMnet due to the expense.
So they are at mercy of signal not getting to them at all because many rural stations have a hard time getting KDKA s signal.
This also means the Homeland Security National Emergency Signal will not get out .
The entire emergency alerting chain is down and damaged.
There will be no national Test this year either . There where so many stations last year who never got the national emergency message across the country it was considered a failure.
Please get hold of your elected federal officials and congressman and let them know we need funding to
get and properly maintain these signals .
As far as when Pittsburgh will have a signal back up is unknown I have contacted various State County Emergency Management Agency's to try and put pressure on PEMA to put pressure on FEMA to get this
situation to be remedied ASAP
as we are at the start of Severe thunderstorms and Tornadoes. Season.
UPDATE
The servive is back online
Thankyou to Pa. State Senator Jay Costa
PAB
and PEMA
The service was restored June 10th