Emergency Notification System

Bowen Island Municipality's free emergency notification service is powered by Alertable. Subscribe now to get notifications about emergencies or advisories on Bowen Island that may impact you. Signing up is easy and can be done from your mobile phone, tablet, or computer.

In the event of a local emergency, social media and Alertable will play a key role in communicating information and instructions to the community.

Follow Bowen Island Municipality on Facebook and Twitter, bookmark the Emergency Operations Centre page, and sign up for Alertable below.

We're now using Alertable to send emergency notifications. If you previously subscribed to BowENS, your contact information was moved to the new system, but you will only get CRITICAL alerts. To get ADVISORY alerts, we recommend that you get the Alertable app on your smartphone.

Alertable provides you with important emergency information, such as imminent threats (e.g. wildfire) and local incidents that affect specific areas of Bowen Island (e.g. road closure). Alertable can send emergency notifications island-wide or to targeted areas, which can be helpful for neighbourhood-specific emergency directions like evacuation orders.

Once you have the app installed on your smartphone, you can go into "Settings" to customize location and types of notifications you will receive. We recommend you go into “Advanced Advisory Settings” and ensure that all of the various alert types have been selected. 

Examples of ADVISORY (be aware) alerts:

  • Road closure
  • Water service interruption
  • Weather alerts (from Environment Canada)

Example of CRITICAL (imminent danger) alerts:

  • Wildfire
  • Evacuation order
  • Amber alert

You can sign up to receive emergency notifications by text message, email, or phone, however, we encourage residents to download the Alertable app for iOS and Android smartphones.

If you have any questions, please contact us at 604-947-4255 ext 251 or bim@bimbc.ca, or read the Frequently Asked Questions.

What is the difference between Alertable and AlertReady?

AlertReady is the Federal/Provincial Wireless Public Alerting (WPA) system designed to deliver critical and potentially life-saving alerts to Canadians through television, radio and wireless devices. This system does not require sign-up. Alertable is the notification system provided by Bowen Island Municipality to notify you of any incidents that hit closer to home, and requires users to sign-up. Note that the WPA will take precedence over notifications you will receive from the Municipality, as required by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). For more information, please visit the CRTC website. 

Last Updated on 2021-11-18 at 1:44 PM