The City of St. Louis continued testing tornado sirens last week after Mayor Cara Spencer said previous tests had revealed systemic failures.
As KTVI St. Louis reports, the sirens went off around the city as part of the latest test. Residents took notice as they were outside continuing to clean up from the deadly storm that landed without warning on the previous Friday. Warning sirens failed to be activated ahead of what she called “the most horrific and deadly storm our city has seen in my lifetime,” including a tornado that killed five people and injured dozens.
“This is going to take some time to repair,” Pastor Donnie Moore, St. Samuel Temple, said. Moore was out mowing the church’s lawn when the storm hit. “There was no sense of urgency except for that fact that it may rain and mess up my hair,” he said. With no siren to warn him on Friday, Moore narrowly made it inside the church. “Went inside and I had an opportunity to lock one of two locks before the wind was pulling the door out of my hand,” he said.
Mayor Spencer said the tornado sirens never went off because the City Emergency Management Agency (CEMA) staff were not in the office to activate them when the storms hit. “We knew there was weather coming. We should’ve been at the button,” she said. CEMA Commissioner Sarah Russell is now on paid leave as the city investigates.
The mayor released audio of a phone call Russell made to the St. Louis Fire Department during the storm. “Okay. You got the sirens?” Russell said.
“Yes ma’am,” someone answered. But at no point was an order clearly stated to turn on the sirens. “I listened to the recording. It is my takeaway that the direction was not clear,” Spencer said. Even if the button had been pushed at the fire department, it is unclear if it would have worked.
Mayor Spencer said Tuesday’s siren test revealed systemic failures, which included the button at the fire department not working. She also said some sirens were damaged in the storm. “I do have hope, and I have confidence that we, as a unified city, are going to fix the systemic issues one-by-one and we are going to make our emergency response work for this community and we are going to respond to this calamity to address the needs of our community,” Spencer said.
There are 60 sirens through the city that were installed in 1999. Both CEMA and the fire department have a button to activate the sirens, but up until now, it has always been CEMA’s responsibility to sound the alarm.
Through executive order Tuesday, Mayor Spencer has now handed that responsibility over to the fire department. The sirens will now to be activated from an office that will be staffed at all times.
As USA Today reports, the National Weather Service said at least half a dozen tornadoes struck Missouri and neighboring Illinois. According to officials, at least 5,000 properties were damaged in St. Louis. The twisters were part of a major system of severe weather that tore through the Upper Midwest and some of the eastern states on May 16, killing more than 30 and leaving many damaged homes and downed power lines.
Spencer estimated the damage in St. Louis at around $1 billion. She and other Missouri officials have complained that federal response to the disaster hasn’t mobilized quickly enough, saying the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) had no presence on the ground as of May 19. “On the local level, every organization, community member, elected official, has been on point,’’ Spencer told MSNBC. “What we need right now is federal assistance. This is what the federal government is for.’’
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