Why You Should Always Pay Attention To Weather Alerts On Your Phone

The bad weather notification or amber alert on my phone seems to go off with emergency alerts at the most inconvenient times – like while I’m sleeping at three am. But then again, when is an emergency ever convienient? I’ve been tempted to disengage the notifications at times because those so-called emergencies usually never come to light.  

Tuesday night we went to bed with rain coming down in torrents and Tropical Storm Cindy beating a path to our doorway. We were hoping not though.  

My phone was continually going off with flash flood warnings and amber alerts most of the night, which I mostly ignored. Finally around 6:20 I picked up my phone tempted to fling it across the room, but instead squinted down at a tornado alert. I had a fleeting thought of running for cover – but where? As I’ve said before this house is like a bomb shelter. We should be safe – if there really is a tornado. I put the phone down and drifted off to sleep. Sleep had not been restful with all the bells and whistles the whole night long. 

Of course the first thing I did,  and most of us do when we wake up, was reach for my phone and scroll through Facebook. Most of my local news comes from Facebook. 

It seems Tropical Storm Cindy had made herself known here in the panhandle of Florida. We knew there would be a lot of rain and a lot of wind. What we didn’t know was there may be some damage – and a tornado! Seriously, I never heard a thing after I disregarded the alert on my phone. I told you we lived in what seems a bomb shelter at times! 

Yep…I should have paid attention to my alerts! When H came in from picking up some limbs in the yard I told him there had been a tornado – behind our house – in Ferry Park. Our back yard backs up the creek and to Ferry Park. We were lucky. Most of the damage was on the other side of the park. 

So off we went in the truck, in the rain, to survey the damage – along with a lot of other people from around town, doing the same. I couldn’t get good pictures with the rain pouring down but there are some in a link on this article. 

I guess I won’t be disengaging those notifications any time soon. That doesn’t mean I’ll pay closer attention to them though. 

~Elle

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