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Severe Weather Awareness Week 2016 – Receiving Warning Information

| by Henry Luker

As we head into our second day of severe weather awareness week, today’s focus will be on Receiving Warning Information.

One of the most important precautions you can take to protect yourself and your family from severe weather is to remain weather aware. Being weather aware means you are informed of the weather forecast and alert to the potential hazards. Knowing what to do and where to go when watches and warnings are issued is key to your safety, but a watch or warning is only helpful if you are aware of them. How do you receive information about watches and warnings? With today’s technology there are many different ways to receive this information, including the internet, commercial TV and radio, and NOAA Weather Radio. However, all these technologies have one thing in common: It is up to you to remain weather aware and actively listen for watches and warnings!

It’s important to note that no one solution is perfect: the more, the better safe and protected you will be.

Internet

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Right here at the Iowa Weather Network, we will have the latest severe weather information right there on the home page from 48 hours out, to the day before, before the event, during the event, and after the event. We will be right here during it all providing the latest forecasts and official watches, warnings, and advisories from the National Weather Service.

Another page that you can look at is the official source of weather information, weather.gov. There are five offices that cover the state:

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  • NWS Des Moines, Iowa: covering north central, central, south central, and parts of west central Iowa
  • NWS Quad Cities/Davenport, IA/IL: covering east central and southeastern Iowa, extreme northwestern and west Central Illinois, and Clark and Scotland counties in Missouri
  • NWS La Crosse, Wisconsin: covering northeastern Iowa, southeastern Minnesota, and parts of southwestern and west central Wisconsin
  • NWS Omaha/Valley, Nebraska: covering extreme west central and southwestern Iowa and western Nebraska
  • NWS Sioux Falls, South Dakota: covering northwestern Iowa, southeastern South Dakota, extreme southwestern Minnesota, and Dixon and Dakota counties in Nebraska

Social Media

We have nine zone pages covering regions of the state that you can like and follow on Facebook. These pages will have the latest, up-to-the-minute watches, warnings, and advisories from the National Weather Service that you can like below.

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  • Northwest Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Lyon, Osceola, Dickinson, Emmet, Sioux, O’Brien, Clay, Palo Alto, Plymouth, Cherokee, Buena Vista, Pocahontas.
  • North Central Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Kossuth, Winnebago, Worth, Mitchell, Hancock, Cerro Gordo, Floyd, Humboldt, Wright, Franklin, Butler.
  • Northeast Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Howard, Winneshiek, Allamakee, Chickasaw, Fayette, Clayton, Bremer, Black Hawk, Buchanan, Delaware, Dubuque.
  • West Central Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Woodbury, Idea, Sac, Calhoun, Monona, Crawford, Carroll, Greene, Harrison, Shelby, Audubon, Guthrie
  • Central Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Webster, Hamilton, Hardin, Grundy, Boone, Story, Marshall, Tama, Dallas, Polk, Jasper, Poweshiek
  • East Central Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Benton, Linn, Jones, Jackson, Iowa, Johnson, Cedar, Clinton, Scott, Muscatine
  • Southwest Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Pottawattamie, Cass, Adair, Mills, Montgomery, Adams, Fremont, Page, Taylor
  • South Central Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Madison, Warren, Marion, Mahaska, Union, Clarke, Lucas, Monroe, Ringgold, Decatur, Wayne, Appanoose
  • Southeast Iowa (Facebook / Twitter): Keokuk, Washington, Louisa, Wapello, Jefferson, Henry, Des Moines, Davis, Van Buren, Lee

Online Live Severe Weather Coverage

The Iowa Weather Network, since late 2013, has provided live severe weather coverage for high-end severe weather events and all tornado events across the state, with two radar analyzers and multiple chasers from the field. You can access it online via phone, desktop, laptop, iPad, car: whatever uses internet! It’s an easy to remember link: iowawx.tv. Many convenient features include a scroller with warnings, live radar, chasing streams, severe threats, and more!

NOAA Weather Radio

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NOAA Weather Radio is provided as a service to you by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is a part of the Department of Commerce. NOAA Weather Radio includes more than 900 transmitter locations across the continental United States, as well as Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, coastal waters, the Virgin Islands, and the US Pacific Territories. A special receiver is required for the signal to be received. These broadcasts are at one of seven frequencies: 162.400 MHz, 162.425 MHz, 162.450 MHz, 162.475 MHz, 162.525 MHz, and 162.550 MHz.

Newer NOAA Weather Radio receivers often include SAME (Specific Area Messaging Encoding) capable, meaning they can be setup to specific areas by programming them into the receiver. This will avoid you being alerted for an area that is not of interest to you.

Iowa is blessed with having 27 receivers  covering nearly the entire state without fringe areas. In this case, if a NWR tower fails due to a communications issue or other issue, it can revert to another station that is close to you. Most of the state have two or three stations that you can tune to.

NOAA Weather Radio is a great way to notify you in the middle of the night when you may be asleep or in remote locations where other sources may not be available. It is one of the best indoor warning systems available, however only a small portion of the population uses them. One thing to keep in mind, however, is that the best option is to have multiple sources.

For information on NOAA Weather Radio across Iowa, and which stations to tune to, please click here.

Outdoor Warning Systems

When it comes to severe weather, outdoor warning systems/sirens have one purpose: to alert people who are outdoors that something dangerous is happening and they should seek shelter. There are no statewide or federal policies on when or who activates these systems. It is often times confusing as you head from county to county as different local authorities have different policies. The National Weather Service does not have the authority to activate siren systems, but tries to work with communities that have severe weather warning systems as mentioned.

Some communities activate sirens for Tornado Warnings, others only activate them for confirmed Tornado Warnings, and another bunch activate for both Severe Thunderstorm and Tornado Warnings. The National Weather Service recommended that communities activate these sirens for high-end severe thunderstorms, with wind speeds above 75 MPH and/or hail or two inches or greater. Please contact your local agencies for additional information on these systems.

Television Media

Television meteorologists and broadcasters are required to transmit National Weather Service warnings to the public, via the Emergency Alert System. Many local stations break in coverage to cover these storms, especially with high-end Severe Thunderstorm Warnings, Tornado Warnings, etc. that come complemented with radar and meteorologists that explain things more in depth. Warnings are also scrolled on the TV screen that have the latest information on the threats. Research studies have found that television is the primary source of warning information for consumers.

Radio Media

Radio media is another great way to find the latest warning information. The Emergency Alert System broadcasts the latest severe weather warnings on the air with many stations, like television, providing wall-to-wall coverage of severe weather, ranging from large AM stations to small and rural stations across the state.

Information Courtesy: National Weather Service Des Moines, Iowa