City’s tornado response recapped at wild city meeting Tempers flare around siren timing

By Robert Tomlinson
News Director

THREE RIVERS — In the first city commission meeting since an EF-2 tornado ripped through the city, Three Rivers city leaders Tuesday addressed the overall response to the tornado in a lengthy presentation that was mostly laudatory of efforts with some pointed criticism at a couple points from commissioners.
City Manager Joe Bippus, City Planner John Beebe, Fire Chief Paul Schoon and Police Chief Scott Boling addressed the commission about all different aspects of the response, from when it started to how they can do better in the future, in their presentation.
According to assessment data gathered by Beebe via the city’s building inspectors, he said the tornado affected an estimated 330 structures in the city on March 6, 45 of which were commercial buildings, with approximately 12 to 15 of the total structures deemed to have “catastrophic” damage.
Bippus then gave a quick timeline of events in the initial runup to the tornado and the immediate aftermath. At 3:18 p.m. on March 6, the city’s outdoor warning sirens were sounded for a couple of minutes upon receiving the initial tornado warning. Some time after that, emergency weather alerts were activated on cell phones warning of a tornado in the area. At 3:50 p.m., the tornado touched down and made its way through Three Rivers. Damage reports began coming in just six minutes later, at 3:56 p.m., and by 4:30 p.m., a command post was established at the police and fire station in town, with a “unified command” established with Three Rivers, Fabius Township and Lockport Township. Police and firefighters were designated to address immediate life safety issues, while the Department of Public Services and non-local resources were then coordinated to assist in other pressing issues in the aftermath.
Schoon then discussed the different phases of the city’s response, from life safety and scene stabilization to hazard control and community assistance. He said most of the initial search and rescue efforts were done by nightfall that Friday, and the team was also looking for hazards in the immediate aftermath of the storm. He said there were some difficulties firefighters had in getting to some areas early on.
“The tornado basically cut our city in half. Us being on this side created a bit of difficulty in getting to the other side, and there was a lot of impassable roads,” Schoon said, adding they eventually got access thanks in part to mutual aid partners. Currently, he said the city is in the fourth of four phases of the tornado response, which has to do with recovery operations, which has more longer-term actions, such as debris management, FEMA/state assistance, insurance coordination, infrastructure repair, and rebuilding.
Schoon also addressed organizing volunteers, as well as challenges they encountered early on with coordination, a subject that had been criticized by some, including Mayor Angel Johnston, early on in the recovery effort, as there had been a group of 150 volunteers ready to go Saturday morning that had to be called off due to safety reasons. He said while people could get frustrated with holding off volunteers in the immediate aftermath, it all came down to making sure volunteers were safe.
“Ultimately, we want to make sure people are safe,” Schoon said. “It’s natural for people to want to help immediately, and we obviously support that and it’s very valuable to our community, but we just want to make sure it’s structured and coordinated so it’s effective and safe.”
In his portion of the report, Boling discussed operational challenges during the immediate aftermath and expanded on Schoon’s point, saying that there was widespread debris and multiple downed power lines that caused safety issues toward mid-day the day after the tornado. With the help of DPS, they were able to clear many of the roadways in a timely manner.
Boling added that “spontaneous volunteers” and “curious onlookers” was “not expected” in the immediate aftermath, and on the day after, caused the city to be “literally gridlocked.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Three Rivers that busy or, talking with other people, remembering it be that busy. With all those people flooding into the city Saturday, what it did is it diverted a lot of our first responders to traffic control and also delayed our infrastructure repair,” Boling said. “Our power crews couldn’t get to the downed wires because of the traffic. Eventually, Saturday, we were able to close off some streets and clear out people and address those life safety issues.” Boling added that volunteer efforts in the early aftermath were coordinated to areas they knew were safe to go to, in part because of liability issues.
However, both Boling and Schoon praised the action they saw from the community and other organizations in the aftermath of the tornado.
“We had volunteers Saturday morning from Ohio and Indiana, and I ran into some from Kentucky that came up,” Boling said. “We had a flood of different agencies all come here to help, and to be able to coordinate that and work together for a common goal, it was amazing to see it happen. There were no egos there, everybody just wanted to make sure we were accomplishing the goal, and that was huge.”
“I cannot be prouder of our community and what occurred. Not that I’ve experienced in my career, but I was very impressed with how neighbors were helping neighbors, and it makes me proud to be a part of this community,” Schoon said.
Bippus concluded the main part of the presentation, saying while the tornado may be long past, the city is in for the “long haul” when it comes to cleanup and recovery.
“It’s not over. We’re still in this, and we have a long haul. When we take trees and debris away, we find more damage, like at the cemetery. We’re finding the damage extent of homes, we’re finding damage to the sidewalks, gas line, utilities and underground stuff that might’ve been pulled up by a tree, so we have a road to go,” Bippus said.
Bippus added there would also be an after-action review done to go over what went well with the response and what improvements could be made in the future.
“We’ll have to go back through and say, what could we do better. There’s always room for improvement,” Bippus said.
Following the presentation from city officials, Raul Galvan from the American Red Cross and Jacob Rutz from Samaritan’s Purse gave updates on their volunteer efforts in the aftermath of the tornado. Galvan said they had their temporary shelter set up at Riverside Church by 8 p.m. the night of the tornado, and that 50 volunteers from the area volunteered with the organization’s disaster response in Three Rivers. Rutz said they have gotten at least 110 to 150 people per day wanting to volunteer and have received 140 requests for assistance. Rutz added Samaritan’s Purse extended the time they would be in the area, and will now be helping until March 25. State Rep. Steve Carra also discussed the response, commending volunteers for their efforts in helping in the aftermath.

Tornado siren strategy questioned
One of the most frequent complaints from residents online in the aftermath of the tornado has been about how tornado sirens were used in the leadup to the storm. The sirens went off only once, at 3:18 p.m., when the initial tornado warning was issued, more than a half hour before the tornado actually hit. Some residents, including Johnston, thought the sirens should have been used again when the storm was closer to hitting the city.
During questions from commissioners, and in one of the tenser moments of the meeting, Johnston addressed Bippus about the timing of the sirens, asking why he, as the emergency coordinator at the city level, did not contact Central Dispatch to have the sirens sound again when the tornado actually hit.
“If we’re paying Joe special to be the emergency coordinator, and he knows there’s a storm coming through, and he doesn’t call to have our sirens set off, that is just ungodly to me,” Johnston said. “Why didn’t you try to have our sirens set off, Joe?”
Bippus replied that the sirens “already were” set off, with Johnston reminding Bippus that they were set off a “half hour prior” to the tornado touchdown. Shortly after Johnston began her response, McNary interrupted Johnston to inquire about the relevance of Bippus’ salary to the overall discussion about the tornado response, as Johnston’s initial query was teed up with a discussion of how much Bippus is paid by the city to be the city manager and emergency coordinator.
That discussion eventually led to a heated back-and-forth between the two over McNary’s interruption, which she couched as a point of order, leading later to a request by Bippus for a closed session to discuss the matter further as a job performance review matter, something which is permitted under the Open Meetings Act. That closed session was held at the end of the meeting, in which no action was taken afterward.
Residents then took to the floor to offer their comments on the storm response. Some of the comments criticized the response effort, in particular the sirens.
“The tornado alert, I understand it went off for two minutes, and that’s it. And the storm didn’t hit until a half hour later. I think that’s totally and completely inappropriate,” Blayne Edgell said. “It hit a quarter-mile from my house, and there was no wind, no rain, there was a pile of leaves in my yard, and we went out to dinner thinking there’s no big deal, only to get back and find out there’s all this devastation, and our city only had warning for two minutes?”
Other commenters ventured more on the positive side, thanking first responders and volunteers for their efforts.
“It’s amazing how quickly the city has been cleaned up. You can go through parts southeast of Scidmore Park right now, and the terrace is clear,” Sarah McCarthy said. “As far as the sirens not going off again, yes it would’ve helped for anybody outside, but when the first siren went off, we had alerts, we had everything we needed to know to start doing our jobs to start watching to take care of ourselves and notify our friends and neighbors.”
Following public comment, Schoon provided more context for the siren procedure and why it went off as early as it did in relation to when the storm hit. He said when a tornado warning is issued by the National Weather Service, the county sets off a siren for a few minutes, but there have been various ways the sirens have been done in the past. He said there have been times the sirens have run through the entire warning, which he said “burned out” the weather sirens, and times in the past where they did one siren at the beginning of the warning and one at the end of the warning when it’s over, which Schoon said “causes confusion.”
“So, it was determined let’s set it off at the beginning of the warning, knowing that when a weather warning siren goes off, people need to shelter. It’s not wait and see, it’s get in a shelter,” Schoon said. “My concern is if we were to set that siren off a second time, are people going to fall back to, oh it’s all clear? Now you’re dealing with everyone outside and things like that.”
Schoon acknowledged that the city can also activate sirens, but chose not to in order to avoid confusion. He added that they could do a “better job” at putting out information about how tornado sirens work, and want to make sure the public “isn’t relying strictly on those.”
“Some of the stuff I hear is, ‘I didn’t hear it in my house.’ That’s not what it’s designed for. If the siren’s loud enough for people to hear it in their house, it would deafen everyone outside,” Schoon said. “It’s something where, if there’s a better method, I’d love to hear about it so we can address it and improve it.”

Commissioners praise volunteer, organizational effort
In commissioner comments at the end of the meeting, commissioners had praise for those involved in responding to the tornado.
“I’m very proud of this city for everything that happened, how they did pull through,” First District Commissioner Pat Dane said. “I’m so proud of everybody; I can’t say enough about our firemen, and they do a remarkable job when push comes to shove.”
“To all of our community, all the volunteers that stepped up to help, words will never begin to describe how grateful I am for each and every one of you,” Third District Commissioner Tony Stanfill said.
In other business…

• Commissioners approved the use of $16,500 from the Water Fund’s fund balance for the design and bidding of Middle Street lead water service line replacements.
• Commissioners approved a fireworks permit for the Three Rivers Water Festival.
  Robert Tomlinson can be reached at 279-7488 or robert@wilcoxnewspapers.com.