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FEMA Map Service Center

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(@alan-cook)
Posts: 405
Topic starter
 

I've recently tried to purchase the new Flood Plane maps for our county off of FEMA's website and when proceeding to the checkout I got this message:

You have asked Firefox to connect
securely to www.msc.fema.gov, but we can't confirm that your connection is secure.

Normally, when you try to connect securely,
sites will present trusted identification to prove that you are
going to the right place. However, this site's identity can't be verified.

Has anyone here ever had that error message when visiting the Map Service Center on the FEMA website?

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 11:04 am
 JB
(@jb)
Posts: 794
Registered
 

Haven't seen that, but you should always make sure that you see "https://" instead of "http://" in your browser window before you enter any sensitive information. The "https://" signifies a secured site.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 11:45 am
(@alan-cook)
Posts: 405
Topic starter
 

JB,

Thanks. I haven't entered any sensitive information and followed the advice of FireFox and got the heck out of there.

I'm curious if someone else tried to go through the checkout for the online store if they'd get the same message.

Edit : I entered the checkout for the online store and the browser has the https: prefix attached to it.

What now?

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 11:48 am
(@marc-anderson)
Posts: 457
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There is a warning of periodic unavailability from the 3rd to the 5th at the top of the page.....

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 11:50 am
(@alan-cook)
Posts: 405
Topic starter
 

Marc : this started yesterday, though.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 11:51 am
(@marc-anderson)
Posts: 457
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I got the same message in both FireFox and IE.

They've got a bad security certificate in there somehow.
I wouldn't trust it.
It might be related to their maintenance activities they have the warning on.
Those were supposed to begin yesterday and continue through tomorrow.

Can you get by with a Firmette for now? I think you can still make those.

Otherwise I'd say you're SOL until Monday.

If it was new data, I could give you a workaround using ArcGIS Online, but they look like the old Q3 data maps to me.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 12:06 pm
(@jon-payne)
Posts: 1595
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Very early this year, I ordered a FIS and the same note came up. After reading the message you refer to, I decided to go ahead and order. I based my decision on the thought that their (FEMA) web people had either an incorrect certificate or that the actual ordering was going through a third party.

I have had no ill effects on my card from the order and it has been around 8 months since placing the order.

Jon Payne

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 12:13 pm
(@marc-anderson)
Posts: 457
Registered
 

Jon:

Thanks for sharing this. Sounds like it's probably OK then. The interesting thing is you were actually able to get an FIS. For the areas in Illinois I've been trying to find ones for, it's a dead link.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 12:17 pm
(@alan-cook)
Posts: 405
Topic starter
 

John,

Thanks for the heads up.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 12:26 pm
(@jon-payne)
Posts: 1595
Registered
 

> The interesting thing is you were actually able to get an FIS.

What was really interesting about that FIS was that the contracting company that did the FIS stated that they received a top of dam elevation from TVA of XXX.XX' on NAVD88. However, TVA uses NGVD29 as the elevation basis on that dam because of the time it was built.

What the contractor actually should have reported is that they received a dam elevation on NGVD29 and used a particular conversion factor to get it on NAVD88. It took a lot of time to explain to the FEMA personnel I dealt with.

Between FEMA and the FEMA contractor, I had a total of 5 different elevations that supposedly represented the same thing. The only ones on the correct page were the folks at TVA.

 
Posted : December 3, 2010 12:39 pm