Do you have your weather radio set to go off for a severe thunderstorm warning?

[forty-two]

We're on the edges of tornado alley, and right now we do have our weather radio set to go off for severe thunderstorm warnings.  But I'm rethinking that.  Our county is big, and half of our severe thunderstorm warnings have nothing to do with us.  The one that just went off is for a storm that we would never have known existed if it weren't for the radio going off - it's way to the east of us and is going east.  And on active nights, the radio could go off a dozen times for severe thunderstorms (we tend to get three or more warnings per storm as it moves across the county), and I get tired of the constant adrenaline jolt, the kids screaming "is it a tornado!?!" and hearts racing till we can walk over to the radio and confirm it's not a tornado warning.

 

My criteria for weather radio alerts is "things I want to be woken up for", and when we got the radio I thought I wanted to be woken up for severe thunderstorm warnings (I was beyond freaked at the thought of severe storms at the time).  But I *don't* want the kids woken up for them (which invariably happens, and then they can't get back to sleep, and stay up watching the storm with us, quietly freaked).  And during the day I'm tired of all the ones that don't apply to us getting everyone worked up.

 

So I'm thinking about turning off severe thunderstorm warnings.  We'd still get push notifications on our phones/tablets, so when awake we'd probably notice.  And if the sky looks threatening, we could go see if the red warning light was flashing.  And then we could have less weather radio alerts and know that the ones we get are more serious.

 

Thoughts?  Things I'm not thinking of?

[HomeAgain]

I get annoying screeches on my phone for a weather alert.   It would definitely wake me up if there was a problem at night.  Because of that, I wouldn't have the radio alert me as well.  I can look at the weather channel and see if we're getting any potential non-life threatening weather and act accordingly. Until my phone yells, I'm not going to wake the kids.

 

 

[forty-two]

I get annoying screeches on my phone for a weather alert. It would definitely wake me up if there was a problem at night. Because of that, I wouldn't have the radio alert me as well. I can look at the weather channel and see if we're getting any potential non-life threatening weather and act accordingly. Until my phone yells, I'm not going to wake the kids.

Dh just got a new phone that is capable of receiving mobile alerts, and they *don't* go off for severe thunderstorm warnings (by design, because of how frequent severe thunderstorm warnings are in some areas - like ours). Our push notifications for weather alerts just make a small "ding" - you only hear it if you are in the room - it's not waking anyone up. The weather radio is our only option for a loud, wake-people-up alert for severe thunderstorm warnings. And it wakes the kids just as effectively as the adults :doh.

 

I just asked dh what he thought, and he'd rather be woken up for severe thunderstorm warnings. So maybe on active nights we can turn off the alarm for severe thunderstorms till *we* go to bed or something.

[prairiewindmomma]

I have mixed feeling about this. We used to live in tornado alley and some of our worst house damage came from straight line winds, not tornados.

 

We just used our smart phone alarms, although we own a weather radio. I wake when strong winds hit the house and we already had everything set up in the basement: helmets, shoes, flashlights, etc.

[Guest]

My phone does. It just comes through like any other alert, and I keep alert sounds off from 7-7am so it does not bother me. Plus I check the weather like twice a day.

 

I turned the alerts sound on this past winter for blizzard and high winds alerts.

Edited July 7, 2017 by OKBud

[Pawz4me]

I have the NOAA weather radio app on my phone and yes, it goes off for severe thunderstorm alerts. We don't get a lot of tornadoes around here (some, but not a lot) but straight line winds from strong thunderstorms are fairly common and can do a LOT of damage.

[SparklyUnicorn]

What's a weather radio?

 

 

[forty-two]

I have the NOAA weather radio app on my phone and yes, it goes off for severe thunderstorm alerts. We don't get a lot of tornadoes around here (some, but not a lot) but straight line winds from strong thunderstorms are fairly common and can do a LOT of damage.

I was talking about the WEA alerts - it's not an app but something else - it overrides any silent setting on your phone when they come in. I might have to look into the noaa weather radio app, though, because the weather.com app we have isn't all that reliable wrt timely notification.

[Pawz4me]

I was talking about the WEA alerts - it's not an app but something else - it overrides any silent setting on your phone when they come in. I might have to look into the noaa weather radio app, though, because the weather.com app we have isn't all that reliable wrt timely notification.

 

Not sure what you mean? The NOAA app works exactly like a weather radio. It's not just push notifications, it's a LOUD alert. The alert sounds are very slightly different based on level of alert (from low to max) but my ear can't easily distinguish the difference.

[forty-two]

What's a weather radio?

This is the one we have: https://midlandusa.com/product-category/weather/

 

Basically, it's a radio that receives NOAA weather alerts, and has a 90 decibel (or something like that) alarm that you can set to go off for specific warnings/watches/advisories. Some can't be turned off (like tornado warnings), but most can be turned on or off.

 

I'd never really heard of weather radios with alerts before living in tornado alley (where you can have unexpected severe weather during the night and want to be woken up for it). As a kid, we had battery-operated weather radios that were capable of receiving NOAA broadcasts (used for hurricanes), but not one that had an alarm.

[forty-two]

Not sure what you mean? The NOAA app works exactly like a weather radio. It's not just push notifications, it's a LOUD alert. The alert sounds are very slightly different based on level of alert (from low to max) but my ear can't easily distinguish the difference.

This is what I mean: https://weather.com/news/news/emergency-text-alerts-20120514

[Jean in Newcastle]

What's a weather radio?

 

I'd never heard of one before either.

 

[forty-two]

Not sure what you mean? The NOAA app works exactly like a weather radio. It's not just push notifications, it's a LOUD alert. The alert sounds are very slightly different based on level of alert (from low to max) but my ear can't easily distinguish the difference.

What app do you mean? Dh and I couldn't find one that was an "official" NOAA app, but various third party apps that use NOAA weather broadcasts to send out alerts. And this noaa page seemed to say that there isn't an official noaa app (but there are lots of third party apps), but maybe I am reading it wrong: https://www.weather.gov/subscribe

[Pawz4me]

What app do you mean? Dh and I couldn't find one that was an "official" NOAA app, but various third party apps that use NOAA weather broadcasts to send out alerts. And this noaa page seemed to say that there isn't an official noaa app (but there are lots of third party apps), but maybe I am reading it wrong: https://www.weather.gov/subscribe

 

You're right, it's not an official NOAA app. I've had it for years and years and it's called "NOAA Radio" so I'd forgotten it wasn't official (if I ever knew it to begin with). It's this one. We've always been happy with it. We have an RV and travel a lot and it's very easy to change our location on that app so that we get alerts wherever we are--much easier than re-programming a weather radio. Plus unlike a radio I've always got my phone with me. The alert goes off, I pick up my phone and tap the app and then can read the text of the alert from NOAA.

Edited July 7, 2017 by Pawz4me

[FaithManor]

Phone Ap here. For us, straight line winds have caused a lot more damage than the occasional EF1 that comes along. The AP on the phone is pretty loud, and we sleep a lot lighter than we used to so I think we'd be awakened.

[Lady Florida.]

If we had ours set for severe thunderstorm warnings it would be going off way too often all summer long. We did have ours on when Hurricane Matthew came through last fall, but mostly we don't even turn it on anymore. We just use cell phone apps/alerts. I think the weather radio is going to become a casualty of smart phone apps, if that hasn't happened already. Most of the time I just get weather alerts through my phone. And I turn those alerts off sometimes too, because severe thunderstorms are pretty common this time of year. I can look out the window and know if worse-than-usual thunderstorm is coming.

 

I don't know what I'd do if I lived in tornado alley though. Tornadoes (and the storms that spawn them) are different from the kind of severe thunderstorms we get here.

Edited July 7, 2017 by Lady Florida.

[Pawz4me]

If we had ours set for severe thunderstorm warnings it would be going off way too often all summer long. We did have ours on when Hurricane Matthew came through last fall, but mostly we don't even turn it on anymore. We just use cell phone apps/alerts. I think the weather radio is going to become a casualty of smart phone apps, if that hasn't happened already. Most of the time I just get weather alerts through my phone. And I turn those alerts off sometimes too, because severe thunderstorms are pretty common this time of year. I can look out the window and know if worse-than-usual thunderstorm is coming.

 

I don't know what I'd do if I lived in tornado alley though. Tornadoes (and the storms that spawn them) are different from the kind of severe thunderstorms we get here.

 

I think that's largely true, except that even in this day and age there are areas of the U.S. that still don't have decent cellular coverage. For that reason we also carry a weather radio with us in the RV.

[Lady Florida.]

I think that's largely true, except that even in this day and age there are areas of the U.S. that still don't have decent cellular coverage. For that reason we also carry a weather radio with us in the RV.

 

People say landlines are nearly extinct, but until there's reliable cellular coverage everywhere I don't think they'll go away either.

[HollyDay]

yes. my phone goes off for severe weather.  And yes, I do have a weather radio too :)

[Jean in Newcastle]

I am surprised there are people who have never heard of a weather radio.  But then, I am kind of a weather geek lol. 

 

No, I have nothing set up specifically to alert me to particular warnings.  I tend to already KNOW when weather is approaching, or predicted to approach, because I check the weather, and weather radar, multiple times a day, just like my bank account. I even check right before bed so I know if there's likely to be a severe storm at like 3am....and I am usually going to be waking up around that time as a result.  Even if I don't, the thunder will likely automatically wake me up, like I am listening for it.

 

We don't have tornados here or at least very rarely and even then it is a small one. We know about wind and rain storms ahead of time from the weather report - I don't think that we've ever been surprised by a sudden storm.  And for the kind of weather we have - thunderstorms or a windstorm - other than stocking up on batteries and/or food, I don't know what I would do with the information on a weather radio or app.  I mean, I will hear the thunder and feel the wind and we won't know if there is going to be any damage unless it happens.  Our biggest threat here is earthquake and to date, there is no alert for those though they are working on a system that will give you about 20 seconds warning. . .  

[Okra]

No way. No how. There are way too many severe thunderstorm warnings for me to want to have a weather radio screech at me.

 

Tornado warnings, yes. But, we generally weather aware when there are moderate risks of tornadoes.

[mamaraby]

Didn't they change the way they issue warnings so that they could issue them for part of a county instead of an entire county? Around here there's a local TV station that holds weather radio set-up drop-in events.

 

I don't own a weather radio, so I have multiple weather apps - AccuWeather, Weather Channel, and two local TV stations. I have alerts set-up on those for both the ones on my phone and for the ones on my iPad. Last week we had a tornado warning issued for our area. The weather app alerts hit a full five minutes before the sirens went off. We were already headed to the basement by the time we heard the sirens.

 

Apparently during the siren test last week, some of the sirens failed to function and although they were fixed, the Deputy that heads up Emergency Management for our county has advised residents to also utilize alerts on phone apps.

 

The apps only send me alerts for my section of the county. If it is issued for north or south of me I don't get them. I do want to know about severe thunderstorm warnings because they often preceed tornado warnings.

Edited July 7, 2017 by mamaraby

[lea1]

We are in tornado alley and have had a weather radio for years.  FINALLY, we recently reset it to only alert for tornado watches and warnings, NOT severe thunderstorms.  I like it much better this way and wish we had had it set up that way from the beginning.  Can't count how many nights we have been awakened multiple times for severe thunderstorms.....every one of them we could have slept through without any problems.  We have never had a severe thunderstorm in which we would have needed to do something different than we were already doing (staying indoors).  We have never had to go to our tornado shelter for a severe thunderstorm.

Edited July 7, 2017 by Lea in OK

[Ottakee]

Well, I would have said skip the severe thunderstorm warning but just last night we had severe storms roll through our area with 101mph winds and either straight line winds or a tornado (conflicting reports) but there was never a tornado watch or warning posted.....just the severe thunderstorm.

Many, many trees down, power lines down all over....our estimate repair is Sunday night by 11:30pm. For most people there was really nothing to do differently until the storm passed and daybreak came.....except for the gentleman that was killed when a huge tree hit his house and bedroom. Had he been in his basement he would be alive today.

[73349]

NO, it would go off like a hundred times a year here. That's one I had to turn off. I don't want to be jumping out of my skin over that.

[BarbecueMom]

I get texts from our 911 service only when a severe thunderstorm or tornado warning box covers my address. It's nice to not get warnings going off when they are on the other side of the county.

 

When I signed up, I chose not to get any other kinds of alerts, like flash floods because I'm on higher ground, or watches. I don't get freeze/frost advisories either, because I don't have a garden or outside animals. I think I get local missing child alerts too, when the child is missing from or sighted in the immediate area, with a bit more information than the general Amber Alert that I get on my phone.

 

When there is bad weather overnight, either DH or I are at least half awake to monitor the radar, and the kids sleep in the basement those nights anyway.