With the recent snow that hit the state of Iowa, an expert in Dallas County highlights the importance of distinguishing between different winter alerts.

According to Dallas County Emergency Management Coordinator AJ Seely, the two most common alerts that are sent out by the National Weather Service are a winter weather watch and winter weather warnings. He reveals that a watch indicates that conditions are favorable for a specific type of event, whereas a warning informs people that winter conditions are currently happening in the area. 

Seely tells Raccoon Valley Radio that the National Weather Service did make a change to the terms of wind chill advisory and wind chill warning, as now they will be under the phrase of “extreme cold.”

“From a user’s standpoint, there’s not really a lot of change. They’re just doing that to kind of clarify their language that whether it’s extreme cold because of the temperature or whether it’s extreme cold because of the wind, we’re just blanketing that under one category, that’s called extreme cold.”

He says this adjustment will hopefully stress to people that conditions are not suitable to be outside for long stretches of time. Seely encourages people to download the Smart 911 app through the Google Play Store or Apple Store to stay updated with crazy cold conditions, or that they receive notifications through Alert Iowa, by texting “dallasia” to 67283.