After a Tuesday morning meeting in which the Henderson County Fiscal Court voted to fund a new warning system for the Henderson County Office of Emergency Management, Emergency Management Director Kenny Garrett faced some scrutiny later in the afternoon from the Henderson City Commission.
City Commissioner Robert Pruitt asked why the person in charge of the warning siren system in the city and the county—Garrett—didn’t know immediately when that system went offline during a series of storms on Dec. 28.
Garrett spoke to both local governmental bodies Tuesday about the failure of the outdoor warning sirens, saying that a transmitter site at the Deaconess Henderson Hospital was kicked off at some point and therefore didn’t allow the tone to be transmitted to the 34 warning sirens in the county.
Garrett said that once he was aware that the sirens weren’t working, he went to the emergency management office and changed the radio station for the sirens and that allowed the sirens to then go off. From the time he learned of the system’s failure to the time he fixed it took 40 minutes, he said.
Pruitt’s concern centered around Garrett not knowing when the system went offline.
“So, you didn’t know that it was off,” Pruitt said. “What other system are we going to put in place that you’re going to know that it’s off?”
Both Pruitt and Mayor Brad Staton suggested having in place a system in which a notification is sent immediately when the system goes offline.
Jordan Webb, the 911 Director, said that her staff can hear when the signal is sent for the sirens to go off, and when they don’t, they would be able to go to Garrett’s office and change the radio station so that the sirens are sounded. (911 Dispatch and the Office of Emergency Management are both located in the Peabody Building.) She said, though, her staff hasn’t yet been trained on how to do that.
Webb also suggested a return to the Friday at noon testing of the sirens.
At the end of the exchange, Pruitt asked to set up a workshop because, “truthfully, I feel a little nervous about our system now.”
City Manager Dylan Ward said he would discuss the issue with other officials and if needed, set up a meeting at a later date.
Earlier in the day, Garrett presented to the fiscal court.
Garrett asked for a warning system that includes both computer and software. The polygon-based system, he said, sets boundaries of affected areas so that emergency officials can set off the sirens in only the areas where a storm is present or will be coming to.
Currently, he said all sirens go off throughout the county, for example, if there is severe weather in the far end of the county but no effects in other areas.
Additionally, Garrett discussed a lightning siren. The city of Henderson currently has two in use.
The fiscal court approved the purchase of the $11,000 warning system. The court also approved the purchase of one $2,500 lightning siren for use in the county. Officials will determine what site is best for the lightning siren.
In both meetings, Garrett pointed out that other methods of notification in times of severe weather are preferable to sirens, including weather radios, HyperReach and Know Now—two phone notification systems—and television meteorologists. He said sirens are designed to alert people who are outside during severe weather events.
