TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Residents Fine-Tune Their Disaster Readiness

ADVERTISEMENT

By TODD LESKANIC, The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 10, 2007

LAND O' LAKES - Edith Seeton's uncle lives 13 miles from Lady Lake, the place ravaged by a tornado Feb. 2.

Seeton, 40, of Wesley Chapel, worried she might be unprepared should similar catastrophic weather strike closer to home, so she bought a weather alert radio.

Saturday morning, Seeton and about other 60 Pasco County residents showed up at Our Lady of the Rosary Church to have their radios programmed and listen to disaster specialists give tips on preparedness. 'I'm just trying to be safe,' Seeton said.

The workshop was organized by U.S. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Brooksville, and Pasco County Emergency Management. Daniel Noah of the National Weather Service's Tampa Bay office gave a short talk, as did county Emergency Management Director Jim Martin.
Weather radios can be programmed to turn on automatically when the weather service issues a warning for an area. Noah said the weather service will issue an alert if winds reach 58 mph or if 3/4 -inch hail is expected.

The time between an alert and the arrival of bad weather could mean the difference between safety and catastrophe. But Noah said many people don't have their radios programmed correctly. Many times, they have them programmed to turn on when alerts are issued in any county. That can become annoying, and people often turn them off, he said.

'Our warnings mean absolutely nothing if people don't hear them or don't know how to respond,' Martin said.

Pasco residents can take their radios to the Emergency Operations Center on Little Road in New Port Richey to be programmed, he said.

Most weather radios cost $50 to $70. Experts recommend buying a radio with alert capability instead of one that simply gives continuous weather updates. Set properly, a weather service alert will turn on the unit no matter the time of day.

Reporter Todd Leskanic can be reached at (352) 521-3156 or tleskanic@tampatrib.com.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT