The Siren Board

I have been listening to some of the live scanner feeds from Kansas. All of the public safety and Skywarm spotters are doing an excellent job in tracking these dangerous storms. Sadly, with nightfall starting to set in, these tornadoes are going to become more difficult to spot.

While listening to Saline County, Kansas, one of the Skywarn spotters was in a town started with an "M." You could hear a very low-pitched Thunderbolt in the background. Apparently, a tornado was moving towards the city of Salina, from the southwest. Anyone got a clue as to what town this might be?

Currently, I am listening to the Reno County EOC and they tracking a funnel Cloud near the city of Pretty Prairie. I took at look on Google Earth, and they have an STH-10 under the water tower. Likewise, they have a second siren under the water tower across from the fire station on Booth Street. Is this a Federal 2001?

500AT wrote:While listening to Saline County, Kansas, one of the Skywarn spotters was in a town started with an "M." You could hear a very low-pitched Thunderbolt in the background. Apparently, a tornado was moving towards the city of Salina, from the southwest. Anyone got a clue as to what town this might be?

I think that may have been McPherson, they're in the county just south of Saline County, and they have at least two Thunderbolts that I know of (might be a third in downtown).

Thunderbolt #1: http://g.co/maps/rn5qt
Thunderbolt #2: http://g.co/maps/nqd2z

500AT wrote:Currently, I am listening to the Reno County EOC and they tracking a funnel Cloud near the city of Pretty Prairie. I took at look on Google Earth, and they have an STH-10 under the water tower. Likewise, they have a second siren under the water tower across from the fire station on Booth Street. Is this a Federal 2001?

Yes, the other siren on the water tower adjacent to the STH-10 is a 2001-DC. Both sirens seem to be painted the same color as the water tower (silver).

http://g.co/maps/h8ra9

The sirens in a TV news clip from Salina sounded weird.

The tornado sirens in Woodward Oklahoma failed to sound, wonder what happened there?!

hobbeekid wrote:The tornado sirens in Woodward Oklahoma failed to sound, wonder what happened there?!

Repeater failure is what one of the city officials said on TWC. Using DTMF controllers and phone lines as a backup system isn't that bad of an idea.

hobbeekid wrote:The tornado sirens in Woodward Oklahoma failed to sound, wonder what happened there?!

Their primary radio transmitter failed, which meant they couldn't transmit a signal to activate the sirens. Apparently, they do not have a backup base radio with a tone encoder to trigger the sirens. I have a feeling that Woodward will be replacing and/or upgrading their siren system in the future.

That's terrible! kinda reminds me of that siren's for cities ad when you first enter this board....

holler wrote:

hobbeekid wrote:The tornado sirens in Woodward Oklahoma failed to sound, wonder what happened there?!

Repeater failure is what one of the city officials said on TWC. Using DTMF controllers and phone lines as a backup system isn't that bad of an idea.

Reports i've been hearing was that lightning destroyed/disabled the equipment they used to activate the sirens.

Also, annoyed at the TWC reporter, who was preaching tornado sirens are unreliable, and people shouldn't depend on them.
Instead using reverse 911, A weather radio or broadcast media for there warnings.

500AT wrote:I have been listening to some of the live scanner feeds from Kansas. All of the public safety and Skywarm spotters are doing an excellent job in tracking these dangerous storms. Sadly, with nightfall starting to set in, these tornadoes are going to become more difficult to spot.

While listening to Saline County, Kansas, one of the Skywarn spotters was in a town started with an "M." You could hear a very low-pitched Thunderbolt in the background. Apparently, a tornado was moving towards the city of Salina, from the southwest. Anyone got a clue as to what town this might be?

That was Marquette, Ks. There was an EF-4 (at the time) that was being tracked to the West of Marquette near Kanopolis Reservoir.

I'm not sure about Thunderbolts but Marquette has Allertors...