ARMADA, Mich. (WXYZ) — We saw last month in Gaylord how critical of a role warning systems play during severe weather events.
To the surprise of some, including some residents of the small northern Michigan city, Gaylord doesn't use tornado sirens. Instead, Otsego County where Gaylord is located, relies on a CodeRed mobile alert system.
So what happens if and when a tornado touches down in southeast Michigan? In terms of alerting systems, that varies by municipality and county.
In the Township of Armada, residents know all too well how vital proper warning is when a tornado hits; we're approaching the one-year anniversary of an EF-1 tornado ripping through the small rural community on July 24.
Thankfully no one was hurt, but the damage from that storm is still visible in some places.
“The trees were bending almost in half. And that’s when I knew the only way out of this is God," Cheri Barfell told Action News.
She owns a business in downtown Armada. The roof of the shop next to hers was partially torn off by strong wind gusts. She'll never forget the sky that day, like something she'd never seen before.
"And we’ve lived out here over 40 years," she said.
Barfell heard the tornado siren from the police station just down the street from her shop.
Township supervisor John Paterek said improving the area's siren coverage had been a priority for a while, before that tornado struck last year.
“You get some phone calls that the sirens aren’t working, they didn’t hear the sirens when the storm comes through," he said. "So we started looking at what our coverage was.”
In 2019, the township started brainstorming how to expand coverage. The original plan was for four additional sirens, costing around $26,000 each from a company on the west side of Michigan.
In Macomb County, municipalities are responsible for the installation and maintenance costs of their tornado sirens, however the county manually sounds the sirens for 17 jurisdictions, including Armada.
Thanks to additional funding from the American Rescue Plan, the township is now moving forward with an even larger upgrade; 12 new sirens.
It's an overhaul that's going to make a huge difference, said Armada Fire Chief Chris Krotche.
"100 percent for the Township of Armada. So we’re going from about 7 square miles to 36 square miles so we’ll have 100 percent coverage," Chief Krotche told Action News.
For this small rural community of just more than 5,000 people, Krotche said mobile alerts aren't ideal as a primary alert.
“Do you have your phone in your hand? Is it in your room? Is it on mute? These sirens transcend all that," he said.
The sirens, which have battery power back-ups and will sound with strait line winds 70mph or greater, will be going in over the next three months.
Oakland County manually sounds sirens for all of its jurisdictions; there's 276 sirens county-wide.
Oakland County picks up 25 percent of the installation costs for the sirens, while municipalities pay for the remaining 75 percent. The county also pays for siren maintenance, said director of emergency management Thom Hardesty.
Oakland County residents may also sign-up for OakAlert, a mobile alerting system which sounds on devices during a range of emergencies. The tool is powered by CodeRed.
And in Wayne County, the county itself does not sound sirens for weather events but rather uses FEMA's IPAWS mobile alert system, which goes directly to cell phones or other mobile devices. It can also be used for radio or TV if a storm is severe enough, according the county's office of emergency management.
That being said, individual municipalities within Wayne County may opt to use tornado sirens if they wish, they just wouldn't sounded by the county.
The massive upgrade in Armada coming as the images of the EF-3 tornado in Gaylord, which killed two, are still fresh in the community's mind.
It was Michigan's first deadly tornado in more than a decade.
“Had something like that come through here, you’d want as much notice as possible," Paterek said.
