Loudon County designated ‘Storm Ready’ by National Weather Service

One year ago storms rolled through Loudon County. Ninety mile per hour winds tore apart Philadelphia. It is just one example of how weather has impacted the county in recent years.

“Over the last four or five years, we have had a weather event almost every year of some magnitude,” said Daryl Smith, Loudon County’s emergency management director.

The county’s emergency management agency has been working over the last two years to make the county safer when storms hit by putting weather radios in all county buildings and schools and getting a weather monitoring system that lets them know conditions at all times.

“The severe thunderstorms being able to spawn tornadoes, those are the things that we’re really worried about, not losing life and property out here,” said Smith.

They also have notification systems to let residents know of impending storms, and their first responders are trained by the National Weather Service as weather spotters. All those are steps are necessary to be designated a Storm Ready county.

It is something almost all East Tennessee counties have now done.

“There is an application process. We’ve been working through that process, and then we partner up with TEMA to go through and make sure that all these things are in place to help keep the citizens safe,” said Anthony Cavallucci with the National Weather Service in Morristown.

It is a title meant to help the residents in those counties rest easy knowing they will be warned if storms are brewing.

“There are things going on behind the scenes but they can rest assured knowing that everything is being done to make sure that they are safe during severe weather,” said Cavallucci.

Cavallucci says they are currently working with Anderson County to go through the application process.