Today is a first Wednesday, which means that at 11:00am, sirens will blare. At least they will blare in the Kansas City area. Most municipalities and other jurisdictions near us test their tornado sirens monthly. I don’t know how broadly this emergency broadcasting system operates, but I think it extends throughout much of the Midwest.
I was not aware of these monthly tests for many years after I moved to Kansas City. I don’t know when the siren system was put into place, but I know I never heard them until one January morning when my kids were in their late high school or early college years. By that time, I’d lived in Kansas City almost twenty years.
Either the kids were still on Christmas break or they had a snow day. I was home from work, and the three of us were in an upstairs room in our house studying and working. Or maybe surfing on the computer.
All of a sudden, sirens blared. “What’s that?” I asked in alarm.
The kids stared at me. “It’s the emergency siren test,” my son said sounding as if he thought I was stupid.
“Why are they testing?” I asked.
“They do it every month, Mom,” my daughter said. “Eleven o’clock on the first Wednesday.”
“How did I not know this?” I wondered.
Then I thought about it. My office was underground. Throughout all my years in Kansas City, my office had been underground, or deep within a building built into the side of a hill.
In fact, when one department where I worked was moved from one location in this building to another, we asked if it would be possible to have windows in the new space. “Only if you want to see worms,” we were told. In other words, our department was relocated to a part of the building so far back against the hill there was only dirt beyond us.
So I shouldn’t have been surprised I’d never heard the sirens. I suppose I probably was out and about at 11:00am on a first Wednesday at some point in the twenty-odd years I’d worked in that building, but the sirens never caught my attention.
My kids, by contrast, went to schools built above ground with lots of windows. Easy to hear the sirens.
And so they taught their mother something that cold winter morning.
Since that time, I’ve learned most locations in this area test their sirens on the first Wednesday of the month, though there are some variations. The tests are canceled only when extreme cold might damage the equipment or when there is the possibility of severe weather in the area that might cause confusion as to whether the sirens are for real or just a test. (Though apparently, Kansas City rescheduled the first Wednesday drill because of a parade after the Chiefs won the Super Bowl in 2020.)
Even though I didn’t know about the tests, I did know the sirens existed, and I’ve heard them for real on several occasions. When there is an actual threat of tornadoes, the weatherpeople in the area take over the local television stations and transmit non-stop warnings as to where tornadoes have been seen and what their probable paths and timelines are. The weatherpeople caution everyone to head for their basements or other safe locations.
In the more than forty years I’ve lived in Kansas City and heard these warnings, I have only gone to our basement on two occasions. Once, the tornado hit a mile south of our house. The other time, it hit a mile north. Both caused significant destruction in their paths.
On other occasions when the sirens have blared, I’ve felt safe enough waiting to see if tornadoes will materialize near me.
When we built our new house, the one thing my husband insisted on was that we have a tornado shelter in the basement. So far, we have not used it.
We keep our camp chairs and a radio in the storm shelter. In addition, I just peeked in and noticed he is storing personal floatation equipment from his Coast Guard Auxiliary unit, as well as oars from his rowing shell. In case of floods, I presume.
Are you prepared for a tornado?
P. S. Of course, given that I chose to write about the sirens today, the Kansas City area decided to postpone the siren test today, due to our inclement waether. https://fox4kc.com/weather/tornado-siren-test-postponed-across-kc-area/ I thought something was missing at 11:00 today.
My “safe room” needs help. It’s a storage unit, but in an emergency I can squeeze in. I live in a one-story home. I need to equip safe room with blankets, granola bars, and water. Maybe some meds too, and a flashlight and a radio I crank up rather than depending on plugging into a socket with no electricity. More for the “To Do List.”
There’s always more for the To Do list. We should put water in our shelter.
You couldn’t pay me to live in the Oklahoma City area or Andover, KS.
My dad was born in Pratt, KS, and remembers tornadoes from his very young years. He always said he could never live in the Midwest again. His mother said the same thing. But when she lived in Vancouver, WA, a tornado hit there not far from her house.
I think I’d rather live with the threat of tornadoes, which follow a localized path, rather than hurricanes, which hit an entire region. Or earthquakes, which also can devastate a large area.
But nowhere is completely safe from natural disasters.
Theresa