TORNADO WARNING: IS CAPE GIRARDEAU VULNERABLE TO TORNADOES?

Standing outside his farm home, David Steinbecker heard the warning sirens sound.

He and his family took cover under the basement steps. Minutes later a tornado roared across their farm just north of Perryville. It blew the roof off the house but no one was injured.

His wife, Doris Steinbecker, said she is glad Perryville has warning sirens.

"I think it is very valuable," she said from a relative's house where the family is temporarily staying.

"It is the best way to notify a large number of people at one time," said Maj. Bill Jones of the Perryville Police Department and coordinator of the city's emergency warning system.

"There is no question about it: They do cost money," he said.

But Jones said: "I think it is a very worthwhile investment. I think they are very valuable. They have certainly proved their worth here."

Jones activated the city's four, rotating, outdoor sirens at 8:12 p.m. April 19, after the National Weather Service reported it was tracking a tornado about five miles north of Perryville.

The tornado destroyed more than a dozen homes and damaged another 68 in Perry County. About 70 outbuildings were damaged or destroyed. No one was seriously injured.

City and county officials said warning sirens may have helped in keeping people out of harm's way.

Perryville's four sirens are designed to be heard throughout the city of 7,500 people. They are tested monthly.

The city's first siren was installed in 1979, and the other three in 1984. Total price tag: about $60,000.

When Jones activated the sirens April 19, it marked their first use in a severe storm in at least 13 years.

The sirens grabbed people's attention. The police department was swamped with about 500 telephone calls over the next two hours, most of them from people who just wanted to know what had happened.

There were so many calls that police couldn't free up a line to broadcast a verbal warning on the local cable TV system, Jones said.

Perryville isn't alone in having warning sirens: 87 cities in 15 Southeast Missouri counties have them.

But there are no warning sirens in Cape Girardeau County.

Cape Girardeau installed a dozen warning sirens in 1980 at a cost of $110,000. But the city council quickly voted to remove them after tests showed the sirens couldn't be heard in some areas of town.

In December 1980, the council rejected plans to install a new warning system involving 20 sirens at a cost of $256,000. Council members said it was too costly.

When a deadly tornado swept through Marion, Ill., in May 1982, the issue resurfaced. But again Cape Girardeau council members rejected the idea.

Today there still are no plans to install warning sirens in Cape Girardeau.

"We're not actively pursuing it at this time," said Mark Hasheider, the city's emergency operations chief.

Neither is Jackson.

Gary Niswonger, Jackson fire chief and emergency operations coordinator, said the city about a dozen years ago had been on a list to receive six to eight warning sirens from the federal government. But Jackson never received the sirens and dropped the idea.

Prior to that, Jackson tried to alert the public with sirens and loud speakers on police cars. But Niswonger said that wasn't effective because patrol cars couldn't cover the whole town and people wouldn't catch the entire message being broadcast over the speakers.

Both Niswonger and Hasheider said it would be costly to install warning sirens today.

Hasheider said Cape Girardeau would need from 20 to 25 sirens costing from $17,000 to $20,000 each.

Hasheider said warning sirens can be useful along with radio and television in alerting the public of an approaching tornado.

But he said, "It is not error free, problem free, or maintenance free."

Warning sirens arose from civil defense days when America was worried about a nuclear attack.

"That was before we had the closed-window society that we have these days," said Mark Winkler, area coordinator of the Missouri Emergency Management Agency.

Most homes and businesses are air conditioned today. The windows are closed so it can be more difficult to hear outdoor sirens, Winkler said.

Hasheider said weather radar systems give more advanced warning of approaching storms today.

"Our local TV stations have better access to information that was not available in the '60s or '70s," he said.

Besides radio, broadcast television and cable TV, people also can rely on weather scanners. "You can buy them fairly cheaply," said Niswonger, who has a 16-channel scanner at home.

Battery-operated radios offer one way to keep track of an approaching storm. "If possible, tune into TV," said Winkler.

"Hopefully, as technology is developed, we can get something on line like Weather Alert Radio," he said.

Weather Alert Radio is the National Weather Service's network of radio transmitters designed to alert the public to approaching severe weather. The network was set up in the 1970s, but funds dried up before the network was extended into much of rural Missouri.

Rural electric cooperatives recently contributed $100,000 to set up transmitters so residents of Rolla, West Plains and other part s of south-central Missouri could receive the alerts from special weather radios.

Another group of electric cooperatives is looking at a similar venture to serve Southeast Missouri from Ste. Genevieve County south to Butler County, Winkler said.

TWISTER HISTORY

Two of Cape Girardeau's biggest natural disasters - both tornadoes -- occurred nearly a century apart but left a path of devastation that was recalled for generations.

The first tornado hit the city on Nov. 27, 1850, at 3 p.m. The tornado ripped roofs off buildings like St. Vincent's College and destroyed St. Vincent's Church. The story's path was a half mile wide and 25 miles lone. One man was killed, Henry King, a black man who lived in a house in the garden at St. Vincent's College.

On May 21, 1949 the second big storm struck the city at 6:56 p.m., claiming 21 lives, hospitalizing 72 ant injuring hundreds of others. The story leveled 202 houses and 19 businesses. Total damage was estimated at between $3 and $4 million. The tornado's trail ran from Gordonville Road hill to the Mississippi River south of Cape Rock.

Source: "Images of the Past in the City of Roses"

Tornado warning sirens in Southeast Missouri

Bollinger County

Marble Hill has one siren

Butler County

Poplar Bluff has six

Cape Girardeau County

Zero

Dunklin County

Kennett has 3

Malden has 4

Clarkton has 2

Campbell has 2

Senath, 1

Cardwell, 1

Arbyrd, 1

Holcomb, 1

Hornersville, 1

Iron County

Ironton, 1

Pilot Knob, 1

Annapolis, 1

Viburnum, 2

Arcadia, 1

Madison County

Fredericktown, 1

Mississippi County

Charleston, 1

East Prairie, 1

New Madrid

New Madrid, 1

Portageville, 1

Marston, 1

Lilbourn, 1

Pemiscot

Caruthersville, 1

Hayti, 1

Steele, 1

Wardell, 1

Bragg City, 1 fire siren used regularly to dispatch volunteer firefighters. It has never had to be used as a tornado warning.

Perry County

Perryville, 4

Ripley County

Doniphan, 2

Naylor, 2

St. Francois County

Farmington, 10

Park Hills, 2

Bismarck, 1

Desloge, 2

Leadwood, 2

Ste. Genevieve County

Ste. Genevieve city, 1

Scott County

Sikeston, 5

Chaffee, 2

Scott City, 2

Oran, 1

Miner, 1

Benton, 1

Stoddard County

Dexter, 4

Puxico, 1

Wayne County

Piedmont, 1

Greenville, 1

Williamsville, 1

Source: Missouri Emergency Management Agency