NOAA Weather Radio. I consider it an old friend!
When I was still in the National Weather Service and NOAA Weather Radio first went on the air in the mid 1970s, I had one person tell me that they assumed the system was named after Noah in the Bible and the implication was it would provide warnings for the worst of flooding and other severe weather. They were not teasing. When people toured the NWS Forecast Office, one of the first questions they asked was “what does NOAA stand for?”
I was very much involved in weather radio from the time it went on the air in Birmingham until I retired from the National Weather Service in 1989. We tried to keep fresh information going out over the air 24 hours a day. During times of adverse weather, especially severe weather, we would often update the information as frequently as every 5 to 10 minutes.
Too bad we did not have that great tool during the Super Outbreak of tornadoes on April 3, 1974, when more than 80 people died in North Alabama. However, we did have it when the powerful F5 tornado moved across the Smithfield area on Birmingham’s NW side in early April 1977. We are coming up on the 30th anniversary of that great storm. I will never forget that afternoon. We actually went live on weather radio during the heat of battle. We did not take time to tape anything and put it in the broadcast cycle.
I am writing about weather radio today, because this has been Severe Weather Awareness Week. The subject for emphasis today by the National Weather Service is NOAA Weather Radio. A huge percentage of Alabama can now receive those broadcasts.
The NWS delayed their usual Wednesday weekly test and it will be at 9:30 this morning.
I am always working when there is severe weather, so I have other means of getting prompt warnings. My weather radio is a Bearcat, which I have had over 40 years. It still works good. However, I am going to buy a new Midland weather radio from our nearby Publix store. They are one of the businesses that is joining hands with ABC 33/40 to offer those high quality radios at about half the normal price.
It has the special feature known as SAME, which stands for Specific Area Message Encoding. Translation: you can program a special code into the radio to choose the county or counties that you wish to be warned for.
I still believe in weather radio strongly. It is crucial to have, especially in the middle of the night when you are asleep and cannot see the warnings on TV or hear them on commercial radio.
Here is a partial list of county code numbers, if you want to program your radio.
001007 Bibb County
001009 Blount County
001021 Chilton County
001037 Coosa County
001073 Jefferson County
001117 Shelby County
001115 St. Clair County
001127 Walker County
I strongly urge you to get one. James Spann has campaigned for years for Alabama families, schools and churches, to have weather radios and I strongly agree.
