Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings

Jen Wilson; Vipasha Bansal; William Lewis

Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings

Jen Wilson, Vipasha Bansal, William D. Lewis

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Abstract

It is essential that we communicate with the entirety of an affected population during a crisis, including those who do not speak a region’s dominant language(s). Commercial Translation tools offer a tempting solutions to broaden access and can provide a lifeline when no other resources are available. However, Emergency response managers often operate in the dark regarding the quality and adequacy of these automated outputs. In this paper, we conduct a nationwide survey of emergency managers to understand their current workflows, perspectives, and operational challenges. We then evaluate commercial translation tools against these needs, shedding light on their utility and offering practical guidance on how and when these tools can be safely used in emergency response.

Anthology ID:: 2026.lt4cpr-1.6
Volume:: Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Technologies for Crisis Preparedness and Response
Month:: November
Year:: 2026
Address:: Hengqin, China
Editors:: Belu Ticona, Fei Xia, William D. Lewis, Antonios Anastasopoulos
Venues:: LT4CPR | WS
SIG:
Publisher:: Association for Computational Linguistics
Note:
Pages:: 46–64
Language:
URL:: https://aclanthology.org/2026.lt4cpr-1.6/
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):: Jen Wilson, Vipasha Bansal, and William D. Lewis. 2026. Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings. In Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Technologies for Crisis Preparedness and Response, pages 46–64, Hengqin, China. Association for Computational Linguistics.
Cite (Informal):: Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings (Wilson et al., LT4CPR 2026)
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PDF:: https://aclanthology.org/2026.lt4cpr-1.6.pdf

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@inproceedings{wilson-etal-2026-communicating,
    title = "Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings",
    author = "Wilson, Jen  and
      Bansal, Vipasha  and
      Lewis, William D.",
    editor = "Ticona, Belu  and
      Xia, Fei  and
      Lewis, William D.  and
      Anastasopoulos, Antonios",
    booktitle = "Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Technologies for Crisis Preparedness and Response",
    month = nov,
    year = "2026",
    address = "Hengqin, China",
    publisher = "Association for Computational Linguistics",
    url = "https://aclanthology.org/2026.lt4cpr-1.6/",
    pages = "46--64",
    ISBN = "979-8-89176-450-7",
    abstract = "It is essential that we communicate with the entirety of an affected population during a crisis, including those who do not speak a region{'}s dominant language(s). Commercial Translation tools offer a tempting solutions to broaden access and can provide a lifeline when no other resources are available. However, Emergency response managers often operate in the dark regarding the quality and adequacy of these automated outputs. In this paper, we conduct a nationwide survey of emergency managers to understand their current workflows, perspectives, and operational challenges. We then evaluate commercial translation tools against these needs, shedding light on their utility and offering practical guidance on how and when these tools can be safely used in emergency response."
}

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%0 Conference Proceedings
%T Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings
%A Wilson, Jen
%A Bansal, Vipasha
%A Lewis, William D.
%Y Ticona, Belu
%Y Xia, Fei
%Y Lewis, William D.
%Y Anastasopoulos, Antonios
%S Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Technologies for Crisis Preparedness and Response
%D 2026
%8 November
%I Association for Computational Linguistics
%C Hengqin, China
%@ 979-8-89176-450-7
%F wilson-etal-2026-communicating
%X It is essential that we communicate with the entirety of an affected population during a crisis, including those who do not speak a region’s dominant language(s). Commercial Translation tools offer a tempting solutions to broaden access and can provide a lifeline when no other resources are available. However, Emergency response managers often operate in the dark regarding the quality and adequacy of these automated outputs. In this paper, we conduct a nationwide survey of emergency managers to understand their current workflows, perspectives, and operational challenges. We then evaluate commercial translation tools against these needs, shedding light on their utility and offering practical guidance on how and when these tools can be safely used in emergency response.
%U https://aclanthology.org/2026.lt4cpr-1.6/
%P 46-64

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Markdown (Informal)

[Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings](https://aclanthology.org/2026.lt4cpr-1.6/) (Wilson et al., LT4CPR 2026)

Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings (Wilson et al., LT4CPR 2026)

ACL

Jen Wilson, Vipasha Bansal, and William D. Lewis. 2026. Communicating with the Entire Population: Machine Translation of Emergency Alerts and Warnings. In Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Technologies for Crisis Preparedness and Response, pages 46–64, Hengqin, China. Association for Computational Linguistics.