[NLRS] Storm in Rogers

[Dr. Gerald N. Johnson]

On Mon, 2006-09-18 at 13:48 -0500, Jason Godfrey wrote:
> 
> I live in Dakota country where they sound the sirens for severe
> thunderstorm warnings. I understand why they do it (downbursts can be
> very nasty, just look at the BWCA blowdown) but I still find it darn
> annoying. Even worse was when I lived in Eau Claire - they sounded the
> sirens for almost all thunderstorms. I'd be walking to class, hear the
> siren, and not know if I was about to get wet or have a tornado bear
> down on me.
> 
> I'm not sure where the proper balance is. Blow the sirens too often
> and people will ignore them. Don't blow them when you need to and
> people may get hurt (but I wonder how many people really go running
> for the basement when they hear them versus looking at other sources
> for what is going on.) Maybe a good compromise would be to sound the
> sirens under a severe thunderstorm warning if there is a corresponding
> tornado watch.
> 
> - Jason
> 

trouble with your last algorithm is that I've seen and reported
tornadoes on a day with no watch. Many I know that I've talked to said
since there was no watch they thought the warning was an error so they
ignored it. Yet I had a tornado ON THE GROUND. Now it wasn't much of
one, probably category zero or minus 1/2, but still it was doing a tiny
bit of damage.

Probably there needs to be more than one signal (well there are two, one
for take cover, one for all clear) to discriminate between severe
thunderstorm (which may blow trees over and pelt you with hail bigger
than your hat will protect you from) and tornado ON THE GROUND. And
probably even more those should be segmented by less than a whole
county. Last fall with a sequence of tornadoes on the ground headed
towards Ames they tried to clear the football stadium half an hour
before the game (and they evacuated to the coliseum, by definition the
worst possible structure to be in with large spans). The tornadoes
missed the stadium by 2 or 3 miles while half the football fans watched
from the parking lot that separates the stadium from the coliseum. I saw
4 for sure, maybe 6 tornadoes that day and I didn't see the one that
missed MY house by 200 yards. Because I was hung up in traffic on a road
closed by pieces of a house and some power lines. There were 9 spotted
that day.

There is much need for training of the officials and the public, though
at least a couple of those standing out in the open at the ISU stadium
are meteorologists who have been in business for more than 30 years.
They didn't believe the reports either.

I spot so I don't have to worry about the quality of the spots from
others, but it gets mee too close to a front seat some days, last
November was one of those.

-- 
73, Jerry, K0CQ,
All content copyright Dr. Gerald N. Johnson, electrical engineer