This is severe weather awareness week for Florida -- as declared by the National Weather Service...next week will be severe weather awareness week in Georgia. Click here for info. & safety rules on everything from hurricanes to tornadoes to lightning to rip currents to marine hazards to thunderstorms to extreme temperatures to wildfires.
Duval Co. announced Wed. an extension of their CodeRED Weather Warning System:
NEW WEATHER WARNING SERVICE AVAILABLE TO DUVAL COUNTY RESIDENTS
CodeRED can alert residents in the path of severe weather via phone
JACKSONVILLE, Fla., Jan. 27, 2010 – Duval County Emergency Management today announced that Duval County residents may now take advantage of new severe weather warning phone service called the CodeRED Weather Warning system. This free service will automatically deliver targeted weather notifications for the immediate threats of severe thunderstorm warnings, flash flood warnings and tornado warnings within moments of being issued by the National Weather Service (NWS).
By subscribing, residents will receive a pre-recorded alert message directly to their phones (land lines, TDD/TTY devices and mobile phones) in the projected path of the severe weather. The system automatically sends these notifications 24 hours a day, 365 days a year providing residents critical time to prepare. This becomes even more critical if a tornado comes through the area during the night, when television and radio broadcasts are less effective.
Using state of the art technology and information direct from the NWS the system contacts only those in the affected areas, eliminating many false alarms associated with prior notification methods. CodeRED Weather Warning monitors each NWS bulletin to determine the severity of the warning and the exact area(s) affected coupled with the predicted tracking of the threatening storm.
CodeRED Weather Warning then creates a calling database of all subscribers within the projected area of the severe weather. This calling database is then immediately submitted to the CodeRED Weather Warning automated calling system. By eliminating the need for human intervention to active warnings we have significantly decreased the response time for fast moving storms.
Individuals who wish to receive CodeRED Weather Warning notifications on their home, cellular or business phones should visit here to register. Residents may enter up to two phone numbers per account.
The system will automatically contact Duval County residents with published, residential phone numbers, as well as those who are already registered with CodeRED for general emergency notifications this Thursday, Jan. 28 to tell them how they may register for the weather warning component if they wish.
Residents who do not have Internet access may register by calling (904) 630-CITY (2489) Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m.
Subscribers may also customize their accounts at any time by visiting here , key word search CodeRED or calling 630-CITY.
The CodeRED Weather Warning system is an extension of the existing CodeRED Emergency Notification System in use by Emergency Management and thousands of Duval County residents since 2007.
While there was some wind damage from Sun. night/early Mon.'s storms, the area escaped what could have been a much more significant event (not enough instability). Our Jax N.W.S. has posted an account of a mini supercell near Douglas, GA. Sun. night -- click here -- complete with radar images. It was a classic vortex signature on doppler radar but most likely was aloft so winds of great strength did not reach the surface much like the Duval Co. storm for which a tornado warning was issued early Mon. (see Mon. Jan. 25th Buresh Blog entry).
Nothin' like the skies of our First Coast -- the photo below was snapped by Jason Freymann, Action News videographer.
