Google and Twitter to join forces to report disaster alerts

Google and Twitter have announced a new partnership that will see Tweets added to Google Maps, Google Now and Google Search to add context to events as they unfold.

Google elaborates further saying that related tweets will serve to answer questions about school closings, nearby evacuations and to display what people closest to a storm are seeing.

At the moment, the Public Alerts system is only available for English-speaking countries, but Mountain View says it’s working to add new kinds of social content to more places and its other products for the future.

The news is a tad surprising given Google and Twitter have had a relatively frosty relationship since the former launched its own social network, Google+, but clearly the two have seen that there are bigger issues in the world.