Well there isn’t just one frequency, but seven. Good
weather radios are able to tune to all seven frequencies
and operate by battery. You may be wondering exactly what
the weather radios broadcast? The broadcasts include the
weather and warnings including post-event information for
“all hazards” like earthquakes, tornados, and
chemical spills.
The National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Weather Radio, known as NWR, is broadcast as a public service
resource for the National Weather Service’s severe storm
warnings and the Federal Communication Commission’s
(FCC) Emergency Alert System. NOAA broadcasts (MHz): 162.400,
162.425, 162.450, 162.475, 162.500, 162.525, and 162.550 24
hours a day. An AM/FM radio will not receive the NWR broadcast.
A scanner, radio receiver i.e. a weather radio is needed.
You can be picky with what alerts you receive. New weather
radios allow you to choose the alerts that you want to receive
by geographic area. This technology is called Specific Area
Message Encoding (SAME). The weather radio can turn itself
on for the area selected when an emergency alert is sent
out.
When selecting a weather radio check to make sure that the
radio can run on batteries and that it can tune to all seven
frequencies.
Learn About Predicting the Weather
Learn About Weather Equipment
Learn About Weather Equipment Terminology
Learn How Atomic Clocks work
