[ScanIndiana] RE: Dayton Tornado

[Rob Dale]

> To be fair, the hams here in Tippecanoe County anymore have 
> nobody to blame but themselves.  During the aforementioned 
> tornado, there was no Amateur coordinating any sort of net 
> until the event was already taking place.  That needs to 
> start when there are watches in place, not warnings about an 
> event already on the ground.

That's what surprised me the most - in a Tornado Watch on an obviously
potent day and I couldn't raise anyone since I'd passed out of Peru earlier
in the afternoon, even though Tornado Warnings had been issued just hours
previous north of LAF and NWS was still looking for confirmations up there.

I was parked up by Ross-Ade and walking from the south side of campus when I
saw the storm developing to my south. My walk became a run because it was
obvious this was going to explode, yet by the time I got to the chasevan it
was all quiet on the radio. I gassed up, checked in again trying to raise
somebody since a Severe Thunderstorm Warning was issued, and it was STILL
quiet! It saddens me to see "policitics" turn severe weather spotting into
this sort of situation...

> (Of course, I imagine that being "shut out", maybe those who 
> once were in charge of this stuff on the ham end may have 
> simply said "f*** it!" and gave up.....which I think is a 
> LOUSY attitude.)

Correct - even if they didn't get their backs slapped by EMA in the past (I
worked with the EM back in the early 90's while trying to coordinate storm
spotters with the data we had at Purdue and know how it was) it still is a
job that needs to be done! There's no better method of doing it than
Skywarn... I digress from the list so will drop it there.

 - Rob