Many news reports have recently been written about the large number of tornadoes that have hit the United States this year, primarily, meteorologist say, due to the southern dip in the jet stream. Indeed, there is a possibility that this season could be one of the most active and deadliest. Here is a map from NOAA that documents the peak seasons for each state in the contiguous United States.

Beth Wescott was able to contact Jan Daum at the Sentara Obici hospital. Here is her report:

Six tornadoes have now been confirmed in eastern and southern Virginia yesterday. The Richmond Times Dispatch reported that Sentara Obici Hospital had received some damage, primarily broken windows. Beth Wescott, SE/A Network Access Coordinator, is attempting to reach the network member contact person at Obici.

Click here for video reports of tornado damage in the Suffolk area.

This is a good time to review the map below. If your area has a history of tornadoes, please make sure your tornado response procedures are up-to-date.

The weather is creating news today. A powerful low pressure front is pushing through towards the Northeast from the Mississippi Valley, hitting the warm temperatures we’ve had this week, and creating some fierce thunderstorms and spawning tornadoes in Tennessee and Kentucky this morning. We’ve sent a weather alert to our staff reminding everyone of what our procedures are for responding to a tornado warning or sighting in our area:

• Tornado warning: announce the warning is in effect, ask staff and patrons to move away from windows and exterior doors
• Tornado sighted in the area: announce we are initiating Shelter-In-Place, and that everyone should take shelter on our basement level in the hallway. (Best shelter from a tornado: as low in the building as possible, as close to the center of the building as possible)

In addition to monitoring the weather via computers, we have an All-Hazards radio that will issue an alarm in the event of an official alert. So far, we have not had to use it, but today it may come in handy.

We hope our colleagues to the west of us have fared well today. Stay in touch!

Winter is a good time to begin preparing for tornado season. Do you live and work in an area which has experienced tornadoes? If so, what’s your plan for alerting patrons that a tornado warning has been issued for your area? What are the safest places in your building? What’s your tornado safety plan for your home?

Unless you’ve been in a tornado, it’s hard to imagine its destructive powers. On May 13, 2000, my family and I sat in our Honda Civic at a local high school parking lot while an F1 tornado went over us. We had been out for ice cream and had no idea of the possibility of a tornado. In fact, we were parked in the parking lot because I wanted to get a good look at some spectacular storm cloud formations coming in from the southwest. After striking the high school, the tornado then took northeasterly track right over our house, resulting in several downed trees. An F1 tornado is quite low on the Fujita scale, however, the winds from the tornado, estimated at 80 to 100 mph, tore off roofing from the high school and sent metal barrels tumbling past our car. Did it sound like a train? Not this one. However, our car shook violently and visibility was reduced to almost nothing due to the intensity of the rain. Our girls, age 7 and 5 at the time, sat screaming in the back seat through the whole event, which probably lasted less than a minute. My wife and I, greatly concerned, kept assuring them that everything was going to be fine. Everything did turn out to be fine, and we all now have a much greater respect for tornadoes.

The map below is from data provided by the National Climatic Data Center.

For a list of 2007 tornadoes that resulted in fatalities, check out this site from NOAA. Some of the locations may surprise you. Also, check out these sobering aerial photographs of the aftermath of the tornado that struck Greensburg, Kansas, on May 4, 2007.

Claudia LeSueur, from the Thompson Medical Library at the Sumter Regional Hospital in Americus, Georgia, talks about a tornado that affected the hospital library in March 2007.

Questions:

(1.) What happened in your community (i.e., what was the disaster/emergency)?

(2.) How did the library respond? How did the librarian respond? Were there non-traditional (unusual) roles that the librarian performed?

(3.) How has the library (or the services provided) changed as a result of these events?

(4.) What, in your opinion, are the roles for libraries (and librarians) in disaster planning, response and recovery efforts?

According to CNN, the Kiowa County Memorial Hospital received considerable damage on Friday from the tornado that struck Greensburg, Kansas.  Fortunately, the 30 people trapped in the hospital have been rescued with only minor injuries.

Here’s a nice 5-minute video of the recovery efforts at Sumter Regional Hospital.  Note the segment on the importance of staff being able to respond to an emergency.

Here’s an update on the library at Sumter Regional Hospital:

• The print collection has been saved and packed away.
• The hospital budget will likely be tight, so updates of some of the textbooks over the next few years are unlikely.
• The librarian has moved into a modular building behind the hospital, with some shelving, filing cabinets, and a small desk.  She’s trying to figure out where all the print journals are going to accumulate.
• The librarian is going to attempt to get a computer set up in the temporary hospital for the doctors and staff to us.

Click here for additional information about Sumter Regional Hospital.