It’s Tornado Awareness Week in Wisconsin, and Tod Pritchard with Wisconsin Emergency Management has on item which he’d like to see in every household in the state – an emergency weather radio. “It’s really like having an emergency siren right inside your house,” said Pritchard. About half the homes in the U.S. now have the radios, a number Pritchard and his colleagues would like to see increase. There are also cell phone apps available now.
Pritchard said these technologies are only as effective as our willingness to heed the warnings they provide. “Get to a safe place. Don’t waste time, just get to the basement.” A statewide tornado drill is scheduled for Thursday, and Pritchard said this is a great week to go over your family’s emergency weather plan.
Wisconsin’s Tornado Awareness week began Sunday, a day which saw favorable conditions for tornado formation across the state. That didn’t happen. “We really dodged the bullet,” said Pritchard. Elsewhere, tornadoes killed five people in Oklahoma, and did damage in Nebraska, Kansas and Iowa.
