Seven Spanish autonomous communities attempted to send ES alerts to their residents during the power outage on April 28, but failed.
As EL MUNDO has learned, the system, which was specifically designed for such situations, was not functional. This was because the generators at the Civil Protection headquarters on Calle Quintiliano in Madrid, which were supposed to provide electrical autonomy, as well as those at the National Emergency Management Center (Cenem), failed even during the most urgent of times.
As a result, the Civil Protection headquarters was partially isolated, and some institutions, as this newspaper learned from direct sources, tried unsuccessfully to contact Cenem, the operational arm of the Directorate General. They could not be reached either by official phone numbers or by email.
These seven municipalities, as confirmed to this newspaper by the Ministry of the Interior, tried as far as possible to inform the people living on Quintiliano Street, alarmed that they were unable to send ES Alert messages to their citizens. They were told that the system had “crashed” and that they didn’t know “why.” In short, the main public tool for alerting the Spanish population in risk situations failed during one of the most serious emergencies in Spain in recent decades.
This newspaper yesterday asked the Civil Protection spokesperson why the headquarters remained without electrical support, but received no response from the institution. Several sources at headquarters, however, confirmed that the problem was caused by the failure of the generators.
Sources from Quintiliano Street consulted by this newspaper also reported that the Cenem headquarters, a sort of “mini-112” responsible for decision-making when level 3 emergencies are reached and municipalities delegate powers to the Ministry of the Interior, is “in very poor condition and with few resources.”
Although both municipalities and the central government can send ES Alert messages that reach all mobile phones in the respective area, including those without SIM cards, technological support depends exclusively on the Ministry of the Interior, specifically the Directorate General for Civil Protection.
A “Low-Intensity” Blackout
Official sources from the Ministry of the Interior admitted to this newspaper that “the system collapsed” and that “we are investigating what happened.” However, they assured that “although the situation was obviously an emergency, it was classified by the Civil Protection as a low-intensity emergency.”
According to this source, the National Emergency Center itself “weighed the need to deploy ES-Alert” (the central government could do so in municipalities that had requested to be raised to level 3 of the emergency). But beyond the fact that this wasn’t possible, it wasn’t considered relevant, because, after all, it’s a system for warning of dangers, not for informing citizens about prevention protocols.
The leaders of seven municipalities saw things differently. Some of them, as this newspaper learned, wrote messages and attempted to send them, warning at the time of their impossibility. Others simply checked whether the system was working, and when they found it wasn’t, they contacted Cenem to be informed of the outage.
Madrid was one of these municipalities. As this newspaper confirmed, officials in Madrid had planned to send an ES-Alert message, but discovered that it wasn’t working when the system was launched. “It was consulted, and we were told it wasn’t functional,” a regional government source reported. “They didn’t say why.”
Emergency experts interviewed by this newspaper expressed their “surprise” that the Ministry of the Interior isn’t giving excessive importance to the outage of the ES-Alert platform. They understand that this system “would have to have electrical autonomy to deal with such situations.”
The ES-Alert system was introduced in Spain in 2022 based on European Directive 2018/1972, Article 110 of which states: “Member States must ensure that, when there is a serious and imminent threat to public safety or to the lives of people in a given geographical area, a general and effective warning can be sent by mobile communications services.”
The goal is to ensure that citizens are reached “even when the network is congested.” This was not the case during the blackout on Monday, April 28. This is a case, as the Ministry of the Interior admitted to EL MUNDO that ES-Alert failed “when communication with the various 112 rooms was possible.” ES-Alert should therefore have worked even during this difficult period.
Although the first ES-Alert message sent in Spain was sent in February 2023 in the municipality of Guadalajara de Cabanillas del Campo due to a gas line rupture and the resulting leak, the system’s grand debut took place on September 3 of that year.
On that day, the seven million inhabitants of the Community of Madrid received a message warning of heavy rainfall and possible flooding in the region. The water ultimately did not reach the capital Madrid, but did reach the southern part of the municipality. Five people died.
On October 29, during the Dana flood in the Valencian Community, regional authorities did not send the ES alert to the population until 8:11 p.m., even though there had already been fatalities in the overflow area. The State Meteorological Office had already declared a red alert for heavy rainfall at 12:20 p.m., and the Júcar Hydrographic Association had proposed raising the alert two hours before the message was sent due to the risk of flooding in riverbeds and ravines. A judge is now investigating the alleged negligence of the regional authorities.
