FAYETTEVILLE -- Officials in Cumberland County want you to stay safe in case of an emergency. That's why they just rolled out a new, faster, alert system.
All you have to do is register through a link on the County's website.
Unlike the last alert system, you can choose how you want to be notified about severe weather, hazmat situations, and heavy police activity.
If there's an emergency, you can receive a call, text, or email. You'll then be prompted to respond saying you got the alert, so you won't be contacted multiple times if it's not necessary.
Cumberland County Emergency Management Coordinator Gene Booth says the new system is also faster -- delivering about 35,000 messages a minute -- something that could have helped Sandhills residents last fall during Hurricane Matthew.
"With Hurricane Matthew, it just really solidified the fact that we needed to roll-out or find a good product, a better product, with more options, with a quicker response than what we were previously using," Booth said.
Officials want to urge people who have the old alert system to sign up for the new Cumberland Alerts. The old system will deactivate at the end of this month.