Severe Weather Drill. Wednesday April 25

Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Advisory: Sequence of Events for Severe Weather Drill. Wednesday April 25

This morning (April 25) the State of South Dakota working with the National Weather Service will be conducting a drill on severe weather preparedness. Most Counties and municipals will participate in this exercise.

The sequence of events for this exercise starts at 10:00 am in which the National Weather Service will post a Tornado Watch for South Dakota. This watch announcement should come across the NOAA weather radios and other means to alert weather spotter and emergency personnel.

Around 10:15 am, the National Weather Service will broadcast a tornado warning on the NOAA weather radios and other devices. Shortly after that, all sirens in Lake County will be activated. Those that are planning to participate in the exercise should initiate their response plans to rehearse their warning procedures.

At 10:30 the exercise will end. No notification will be given for the exercise end such as an all clear message. The exercise will simply end. At this time everyone should assess their actions and make corrections or adjustment to make their response plans better.

All sirens in Madison should now be working properly. The mechanical problems that were encountered earlier have been corrected. Once activated the sirens should only operate for approximately 15-30 seconds. They should then shut down. If they activate and do not shut down properly they will time out after 3 minutes. All sirens will be manned during the test to ensure that they activate and cancel properly.

Contact Information: Donald Thomson Lake County SD 605-256-7611 lakeema@lakecountysd.com