Town of Andover emergency officials now have the ability to notify all Andover residents of emergency incidents affecting a portion or all of the town. As part of its NH Alerts program, the state of New Hampshire has implemented an Emergency Notification System that allows all communities to make emergency notifications to all of the home phones within their community.

Local emergency officials can make hundreds of automated phone calls, within minutes, to all landline phones within the town boundary – or to just a selected neighborhood, if necessary – about important emergency situations such as road closures or severe weather events. The state can also use the system to notify residents of statewide emergencies.

You don’t have to do anything to activate the Emergency Notification System on your landline phone – all landline phones in the state are automatically part of the system.

Cell Phones and E-Mail

What if you’re not at home, or don’t have a landline home phone? NH Alerts can reach you via your ordinary cell phone, your smartphone, or your e-mail, but you must sign up in advance in order to receive these emergency notifications.

To register your cell phone and/or e-mail address with the system so you can receive emergency notifications, visit NHe911.org/SelfRegistration. The service you are signing up for is called CodeRED, which is part of the NH Alerts system.

(If you have kids in school, you’re probably familiar with the school’s phone-based notification system. This is not the same as the NH Alerts system! Even if you already get phone notifications from the school, you’ll still have to sign up at NHe911.org/SelfRegistration if you want to receive emergency alerts from Andover and state emergency officials on your cell phone or e-mail.)

If you use a smartphone, there is also a free public safety app CodeRED Mobile Alert that will allow you to receive instant, location-based alerts on the go, directly to your smartphone.

If you have any questions, please contact Jane Hubbard, Andover Emergency Management Director, at 848-8801 or JHubb_99@nullyahoo.com.