False Tornado Warn Polygons? - March 4 & 5

[Todd Renshaw]

Silly question, I know, but I'm guessing all these gigantic 18-county tornado warning boxes coming through my feed are more "tests" like yesterday in Wisconsin?

http://fox6now.com/2013/03/04/tornado-warning-issued-monday-morning-was-only-a-test/

Kind of annoying since there were so many at one point that they obscured the, (I'm thinking legit), t-storm warning near Birmingham, AL.

 

[Mike Johnston]

Probably so...we had a warning that covered ~8 counties here in South Carolina this morning. It was only a drill, but sounded real at first. Even the local TV stations got into the act. Beyond the EAS message, they issued warning messages of their own. The school kids took cover, etc.

 

[Chris Cooper]

Today at 130 we were supposed to have a state wide tornado drill but it was cancelled due to inclement weather. I don't know if the warnings were to do with the weather preparedness week testing.

 

[Elaine Spencer]

"I don't know if the warnings were to do with the weather preparedness week testing"

They probably were. Several Midwestern states including Illinois have their official statewide tornado drills on the first Monday or Tuesday in March every year (ours was also postponed due to inclement WINTER weather). The drills usually include sending of a test warning message from NWS offices and activation of the EAS. Given that March is considered the "official" start of tornado season in most of the country I would guess that many of these warning messages were actually annual drills.

 

[Zack Hargrove]

It was an accident:

http://badgerherald.com/news/2013/03/05/false_tornado_alarm_.php#.UTfHndY4vTo