Emergency Alerts test to take place at 15:00 on Marathon Day

Participants and spectators at this Sunday’s TCS London Marathon will receive a short message on their mobile phone testing a new national Emergency Alerts system – designed to issue urgent messages in a time of crisis.

Phone users should expect the message on the home screen of their mobile phone at 15:00, along with a sound and vibration for up to 10 seconds.

This will stop automatically and people will simply need to swipe away the message or click ‘OK’, as they would for a standard notification, and continue using their phone as normal.

Emergency Alerts, which allow the emergency services to issue speedy warnings to inform the public, have been credited with saving lives in a number of other countries.

The alerts could be used in the UK in a defined area to tell residents about severe weather events and threats to public safety, as well as provide clear instructions about how best to respond.