In the wake of Saturday’s tornadoes, here’s the latest on St. Clair County’s new sirens
It wasn’t yet set up for the tornadoes that hit the region Saturday, but a new system of outdoor sirens for tornado warnings is being installed in St. Clair County and will be ready later this year.
Work on the new sirens began last week, according to Herb Simmons, director of the St. Clair County Emergency Management Agency.
The county signed a $2.49 million contract with Acoustic Technology Inc. last year for the project.
“We’re putting in all new ones, even the ones that were out there, we’re replacing them with updated versions,” Simmons said Monday.
Federal relief funds from the American Rescue Plan will pay for the sirens.
Simmons said the work on the new sirens began in the southern part of the county, where there were no sirens.
Simmons did not have a final completion date for the new sirens but noted the contractor had some delays because it had not received parts that had been ordered.
The current siren system, such as the one in Belleville, sounded the alarm Saturday before the storm hit the city.
The sirens are designed to warn people who are outside and not for people indoors, Simmons said.
Simmons recommends residents sign up for a warning service such as CodeRED, get a weather radio and monitor media reports. St. Clair County and Belleville are two of the area governments that offer the free CodeRED service. You can go to the websites for the county and city to sign up for the service.
The National Weather Service has said eight tornadoes hit the St. Louis metropolitan area on Saturday, with four in the metro-east and four in Missouri, according to a preliminary assessment.
No injuries were reported but the tornadoes knocked down trees and caused property damage and power outages.
This story was originally published April 18, 2023 at 12:30 PM.
