Air raid sirens to make way for NL-Alert on cell phones from 2025

The air raid alert to warn the population of disasters will be abolished next year and replaced by NL-Alert, a notification received by cell phone. This was decided by outgoing Justice Minister Dilan Yeşilgöz. In a parliamentary letter, she wrote that the national system of sirens, which are tested on the first Monday of every month, is of little use and has had little success. The range of this alarm is also much smaller than that of NL-Alert.

The NL-Alert notifications are also clearer, as they contain information about the nature of the emergency and indicate what the recipient should do. Such a government alert is sent to cell phones in a specific area via transmission towers. NL-Alert now has a coverage of 92 percent, measured in December 2023. Awareness has been raised through campaigns and an app has been developed.

The current sirens can be heard by about 75 percent of people in a "best-case scenario". In new residential areas or in places where high-rise buildings have been built, for example, this figure is even lower, according to the minister. In order to achieve greater coverage, the municipalities would have to install additional sirens in around 500 locations. The maintenance of the alarm system is also very costly, she wrote. All in all, she believes it would be better to dismantle the system at the end of 2025 when the maintenance contracts expire.

After 2025, if necessary, "additional warning systems" will remain in operation in some safety regions at some high-risk locations, the minister wrote. This could mean that masts with sirens will remain in place, but they may be connected to a regional system instead of a national system, said a spokesperson for the ministry. How exactly this should look has yet to be agreed between the ministry and the safety regions. The Tweede Kamer, the lower house of parliament, also still has to deal with the decision.