With the emergence of mobile technologies and the penetration of social media in daily life, new ways on how emergency response organisations (EROs) can communicate with citizens and visitors in case of emergencies and disasters become available.

The existing mass media channels (TV, radio and press) are complemented by social media with its two-way communication. That is, interactive communication with its potential benefits, but also challenges for existing emergency response and command & control processes. Furthermore, citizens’ expectations of receiving alerts and warnings about day-to-day emergencies are increasing and need to be met.

This document intends to provide a basis by discussing media characteristics from the authority-to-citizen perspective (A2C), inform about communication channel and media characteristics with its strengths and weaknesses and provides examples of communication plans from selected EROs.

EENA would like to warmly thank Mrs. Iratxe Gomez (Atos, Co-chair of EENA Operations Committee), and Mr. Helmut Wittmann (IABG, Fit4Sec,  Vice-Chair of EENA Operations Committee) for their valuable contributions to this publication.

To read the document, please click here.