FCC Completes Test of New DIRS

The FCC completed a voluntary test of the disaster information reporting system (DIRS) Thursday, FCC Public Security Bureau Chief Debra Jordan said in an emailed statement. The test let communications providers practice filing outage reports as they would during an actual DIRS activation. The agency released a new version of DIRS in early December (see 2312040057). “We appreciate the widespread participation in this simulated DIRS activation in advance of hurricane and wildfire seasons, which will help ensure that the FCC can provide the public and emergency managers with timely, accurate data on the operational status of communications networks during disasters and support recovery efforts,” Jordan said. Because the test was primarily a practice session centered on logging in, filing and accessing reports in DIRS, there aren’t results to share, an FCC spokesperson told us.