When Seconds Count, StormReady
Communities Are Prepared
To help Americans guard against
the ravages of severe weather, NOAA's
National Weather Service has designed StormReady,
a program aimed at preparing cities, counties and towns across
the nation with the communication and safety tools necessary
to save lives and property.
About StormReady
The top goal of StormReady is to prepare communities with an
action plan that responds to the threat of all types of severe
weatherfrom tornadoes to tsunamis.
A voluntary program created in 1998 by the National
Weather Services Tulsa, Okla. forecast office, StormReady
provides clear-cut advice to city leaders and emergency managers
and media that would improve their local hazardous weather operations.
Once a community meets preparedness
criteria, outlined by a partnership between the National Weather
Service, and state and local emergency managers, it will be pronounced
StormReady. However, before that happens, communities
must:
- Establish a 24-hour warning
point and emergency operations center;
- Have more than one method of
receiving severe weather forecasts and warnings and alerting
the public;
- Create a system that monitors
local weather conditions;
- Promote the significance of
public readiness through community seminars;
- Develop a formal hazardous weather
plan, which includes training severe weather spotters and holding
exercises.
A year after the violent tornado
outbreak in Oklahoma
and Kansas, and on the heels of last months deadly
tornado strikes in Georgia, John Ogren, the manager for StormReady
at the National Weather Service, said the program could not have
evolved at a better time. As the public becomes more acquainted
with severe storms and the often-deadly impacts they bring, the
only way to save lives is through preparedness and communication,
he said. Ogren added: When the National Weather Service
issues a severe weather warning, the goal of StormReady is to
make sure everyone knows about it, they know what to do, they
do it and live.
Storm Ready Certification
Process
An advisory board, comprised of National Weather Service warning
coordination meteorologists, and state and local emergency managers,
will review applications from municipalities and visit the locations
to verify the steps made in the process to become StormReady.
After the advisory board approves certi fication, the community
will receive a formal letter, along with StormReady signs that
can be displayed along its major roadways. StormReady communities
must stay freshly prepared, because the designation is only valid
for two years. The advisory board seeks to officially designate
20 communities each year for the next five years as StormReady.
For more information about the
StormReady program, please visit the StormReady Web site: http://www.nws.noaa.gov/stormready.
For more information contact John
Leslie, NOAA's National
Weather Service public affairs, at (301) 713-0622.
NOAA
Public Affairs
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Updated February 2000 |