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First responders prepare for storm season
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"Your life is just as important as the people you are trying to help," Steve Runnels told the more than 60 local first responders and other interested people attending the severe weather spotter training class held by the Springfield National Weather Service office Thursday night at the 3M Clubhouse.
"We want to keep safety in mind at all times," he said.
Runnels is the warning coordination meteorologist at the National Weather Service's Central Region Headquarters in Springfield.
"I've been to the class more than five times because I want the refresher," Sheldon's mayor pro tem Robert Moran said."I learn something new each time."
In addition to serving his community as a city councilman, Moran is an amateur radio operator.
Runnels opened the presentation talking about safety and communications. Public safety personnel and amateur radio operators have direct lines of communication to the National Weather Service which reduces the time between a trained spotter identifying a severe weather threat and the NWS issuing a severe weather warning.
Runnels said research has demonstrated that members of the public react to severe weather warnings that have been confirmed by trained spotters faster than radar indicated warnings.
"Wherever you are from, you are part of a network of responders," Runnels said. "We cannot be wrong confirming a threat."
Runnels talked about the importance of situational awareness. Both spotters and members of the public should be paying attention to outlooks, watches, and warning.
Outlooks for weather events are issued by the Weather Service two to seven days before the event is expected to take place. Watches are issued several hours before the event is expected to occur, and warnings are issued on a short term basis when severe weather is imminent or already occurring.
"Here in the Ozarks, we see two types of organized severe weather, squalls lines and super cells," Runnels said.
A squall line is a narrow band of high wind and storms at the leading edge of a cold front. While they can be hundreds of miles long, they are typically only 10 to 20 miles wide.
"When we're dealing with squall lines, we're dealing with a wind threat more than any other issue," Runnels said.
Squall lines produce less frequent, and weaker tornados than supercell thunderstorms.
A supercell thunderstorm is a long-lived, highly organized storm that can be as large as 10 miles in diameter and 50,000 feet tall.
The storm that produced the May 22, 2011 tornado in Joplin was a supercell thunderstorm. More than 1,000 people were injured, and 158 were killed when an EF-5 tornado hit central Joplin. Winds peaked at 250 miles per hour and destroyed more than 2,000 buildings and propelled debris more than 20,000 into the sky.
Runnels said spotters main objective is to locate and identify the supercell's updraft because that is where tornados will form. In identifying a tornado, spotters are trained to look for debris and rotation.
Spotters are trained to report what they are seeing, uprooted trees, snapped trees, vehicles turned over; rather than trying to estimate specific winds speeds.
While not as dramatic as a storm that produces a tornado or high straight line winds, other severe weather events like lightning, flash flooding and hail can be just as deadly.
In a March 2016 interview, Vernon County Emergency Management Director Dennis Kimrey said there are no public severe weather shelters in either Nevada or Vernon County. The alternative is for residents to shelter in place, either in a purpose-made storm shelter, or a secure area on the lowest floor of their home. Preparation does not end at home, businesses should have a plan as well. Residents and businesses can register their storm shelters, even if inside their homes, with the county so first responders know where to look for survivors. The link to register a shelter is at http://www.vernoncountyoem.org/.
Kimrey said that every home and business should have a weather alert radio with a battery back up which are available at local retailers for as little as 15 dollars. Nevada, Sheldon, and Harwood are the only communities in Vernon county that currently have severe weather sirens. Severe weather can develop with little to no warning so storm sirens, which are only activated for tornado warnings, should not be relied on as a primary means of receiving severe weather notifications.
In addition to a weather radio, Kimrey recommended checking the Situation Report on http://www.weather.gov/sgf/ each morning. There are also a number of apps for smart phones and other devices, which relay weather alerts from the National Weather Service. The Vernon County Office of Emergency Management website at http://www.vernoncountyoem.org/ also has links to severe weather information and instructions for reporting weather related damage.