A test of the ‘Blue Alert’ system to inform the public of law enforcement in danger will take place tomorrow.
On Wednesday, October 23, between 1:30 pm and 2:30 pm, an exercise of the Vermont Blue Alert System will be conducted by the Vermont Department of Public Safety, state emergency authorities said Tuesday, October 22.
The exercise will test the functionality of various components of Vermont’s Blue Alert system, officials say. Specifically, the VT-Alert system will send messages to the thousands of subscribers, the Vermont Agency of Transportation message boards will be populated with exercise information, and VT Lottery will activate their system to message their signs, tickets, and kiosks. The Emergency Alert System (EAS) will also be utilized to send test messages to TV and radio stations. As in the past, the Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) will not be utilized.
During this exercise, phone alerts will only occur for those who have signed up for VT-Alert.
The Vermont Blue Alert System is designed to rapidly disseminate information to the public when a law enforcement officer has been seriously injured, killed, or is missing in the line of duty warranting concern for the officer’s safety, and the suspect(s) involved have fled and pose an imminent threat to the public or other law enforcement officers.
Program Guidelines
A Blue Alert may be activated by a law enforcement agency when a law enforcement officer has sustained a serious bodily injury, been killed in the line of duty, or when an action(s) or threat(s) to kill or seriously injure a law enforcement officer have been deemed imminent and credible.
State officials say that the following situations meet Blue Alert criteria:
A law enforcement officer has sustained serious bodily injury or been killed in the line of duty; and,
The suspect(s) has not been apprehended; and,
The suspect(s) poses an imminent threat to the public or other law enforcement officers; or
A law enforcement officer is missing in the line of duty under circumstances warranting concern for the officer’s safety; and,
There is enough descriptive information for law enforcement to believe a Blue Alert will help locate the law enforcement officer, the suspect(s), and/or vehicle(s) involved; and,
The initiating law enforcement agency is willing and able to provide resources and assist in the investigation.
The Blue Alert Foundation is a non-profit organization set up to operate, maintain & improve the National Blue Alert System that enables communication between law enforcement, transportation & news/social/wireless medias. It also works to bring support to the families of fallen officers and bring body armor, body cameras, squad car cameras and more to the law enforcement agencies that are not able to obtain this critical safety equipment.