Case Study: University of Central Florida achieves rapid, campus-wide emergency alerts during Hurricane Irma with Rave Mobile Safety

University of Central Florida Keeps Campus Safe Through Hurricane Irma with Rave Alert™

The University of Central Florida (UCF), a sprawling campus with more than 68,000 students and 13,000 faculty and staff, needed a fast, reliable replacement for its Layer 3 distributed mass‑notification system after its vendor left the market. With tornado warning lead times averaging only 13 minutes and roughly 76,000 people to reach, UCF required an intuitive emergency alert solution — it selected Rave Mobile Safety’s Rave Alert to deliver campus-wide text, email, loud-voice and geo-fenced notifications.

Rave Mobile Safety implemented Rave Alert across UCF, enabling automated enrollment, geo-fencing for National Weather Service tornado polygons, and SMS opt‑in for temporary law‑enforcement staff. During Hurricane Irma the system sent tornado warnings to about 76,000 recipients in roughly two minutes — about 18 minutes faster than surrounding county alerts — supported daily hurricane updates and shelter/class/closure notices, and now serves ~78,000 users with under 5% opting out, demonstrating clear improvements in speed and reliability.

University of Central Florida

Joe Thalheimer

Warning and Communications Coordinator