The Boy Who Cried, "Wolf!" or Why a Community-based Alert System is a good idea.

 A community initiative to provide early warnings to a single disaster, such as a tsunami disaster, can grow into a bridge that connects the national disaster management to the coastal city that is at risk. This case study uses the fable of the boy who cried wolf to describe the components of an alerting system by analyzing the hazard, the community, and the communication mechanism. Finally, case describes one such initiative, the Community Tsunami Early-warning Centre of Peraliya, Sri Lanka.