Not a Fan of "Beat the Tornado"

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While I agree the Henryville tornado was a difficult case (NWS initially had the tornado going north of Henryville, thus diminishing the amount of lead time to school administrators), I don't like the idea of herding kids onto buses and playing "beat the tornado."


I have advocated, over and over, that business and schools must have a plan that deals with these contingencies. Just gave this message today in Memphis at my AccuWeather tornado seminar and will do so again tomorrow in Nashville.  


For reasons that are unclear to me, getting people to respond has been more difficult than I would have expected to get people to respond. I'm almost starting to get cynical and believe they don't want a plan because that would introduce more accountability. 


I'm also not a fan of dismissing school early or calling off school if the school is soundly constructed with a safe room. Administrators will -- undoubtedly -- be sending children into less safe situations. The parents should have the option to pick up their kids early but dismissing kids as tornadoes approach is, on balance, a bad idea.  

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