With the warmer weather moving into the area, knowing what to do in the event of severe weather is important to brush up on. 

Dallas County Emergency Management Coordinator A.J. Seely says plan ahead in the event that you hear a tornado siren in your community, you should go to the most interior part of your home away from windows such as a bathtub if you don’t have a basement, or a community storm shelter. 

“It should be done ahead of time. Make sure that you know where you’re going to go and you know where your family is going to go before the tornado warning starts because it’s always hard to try to figure out where we’re going to go and if there is enough room in the space and if it’s the best space.”

Seely notes when a tornado siren goes off that generally means a tornado warning for the community has been issued . Also, Seely notes it will go off for other reasons.

“We will sound for severe thunderstorm warnings which include winds of 70 MPH or greater and so that’s kind of back to the August derecho. That’s kind of the winds that we were seeing or we were forecasted to be seeing and so our new thresholds will include that 70 MPH wind.”

Seely says whenever you hear a tornado siren, regardless of why it is going off, people should move indoors and seek additional information.