40 mayors have expressed their desire to learn how to activate the BG-ALERT system themselves in crisis situations. Almost a month after the fire in the village of Voden, the question of why the system never worked remained without a definitive answer.
Without receiving any notification, the people in Voden village guessed on their own that they had to escape from the disaster. Instead of a telephone warning, the church bell rang in the village.
The question of why the notification system never worked in Voden was also raised at a meeting of the transport committee in the National Assembly. “I don't know how you felt when the Bulgarian church took the people out of the populated areas with a bell,” said the People's Representative from ITN Ivan Kyuchukov during the meeting. He called for an investigation into what the problem was with the disaster notification system.
„I think that the BG-ALERT system is not the only one that should be used. In Bulgaria, there is a siren system, which we also hear on June 2. The church has bells that can be rung. World practice shows that when a person thinks about how to react in crises, he keeps even the simplest systems with which he can save himself”, comments the chairman of the KRS Ivan Dimitrov.
For comparison, in such crisis situations, the European practice for warning the population is precisely messages on mobile phones. Such, for example, were sent to subscribers in Greece, who are close to the fires around Athens. However, what has been done to have all Water Range subscribers to be able to receive a BG-ALERT message? The Communications Regulatory Commission, which is supposed to be looking into this question, according to NOVA, sent an email about the case to mobile operators only 12 days after the fire started. We reached out to KRS for a position as early as last week, but as of the time this report aired, there were still no responses. It is not yet clear whether all mobile operators had coverage in the Voden area. The Ministry of Transport told NOVA that “in general, coverage of at least one operator is provided in the territory of 72.4 square km around the village of Voden, and in 63% of the land it has high speeds”. It is clear from the meeting of the transport committee in the National Assembly that no one from the village received a notification from the system, simply because no one tried to send.
„It just takes a little more time for the relevant institutions to get used to the fact that it is a possible resource. Then the system will start to be used more efficiently, commented in "Your Day". the director of DG “Fire safety and population protection” Ch. commissioner Alexander Jartov.
Very soon, mayors should also be able to activate BG-ALERT. For this purpose, they must go through training, in which they can join only if they want. “These trainings that I mentioned start from next week. They have to decide whether they want to use this tool or not. Mandatory introduction may not be the best option, added Zhartov. More than 40 of the mayors in the country have already expressed their desire and want to learn how to activate the system themselves if it becomes necessary again.