The Bureau of Meteorology has apologised after a tsunami warning was sent for Australia’s east coast today in error.
The bureau said there was no threat after the tsunami alert was sent to users of the BOM Weather app between 11am and 12pm today.
“The Bureau acknowledges and apologises for any confusion that this test may have caused,” it said in a statement.
“The test warnings were sent to the BOM Weather app for various locations. The test warnings were cancelled immediately after they were issued.”
The false alerts were sent during a planned transition to a new tsunami early warning software.
In the BOM Weather app, users were warned via a notification of a “tsunami threat to the marine environment” on the NSW, Victoria, Queensland and Tasmania coast.
The warnings were marked “TEST” inside the app.
The warning was live about 11.42am, as seen in screenshots shared with 9news.com.au.
The alert was later cancelled.
“There is NO tsunami threat to Australia,” the bureau said.
Testing is important for the bureau and partners to plan for real tsunami threats, the bureau added.
It works in tandem with the Joint Australian Tsunami Warning Centre (JATWC) which operates 24 hours a day to detect, monitor and warn of any tsunami threat to Australia.
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