One unoccupied mobile home damaged; storm siren issues revealedAttala County escaped injuries and major damage as two reported tornadoes skirted the area Saturday night.
The first storm cell, which reportedly included a tornado touching down just south of Goodman, took out trees in the area of County Road 3102. That cell toppled a tree through the bedroom ceiling of an unoccupied mobile home on County Road 3111, according to Danny Townsend of Attala County Emergency Management. It was the only residential damage reported thus far.
An evaluation team from the National Weather Service was expected to visit Attala County Tuesday, and continues to verify and assign strength scales to confirmed tornadoes, like the one that touched down south of Goodman.
In a second local cell, the National Weather Service in Jackson says an EF-1 tornado touched down in Thomastown. According to Townsend, that cell moved through Zama causing little damage before it crossed into Winston County.
With heavy rains falling in relatively short periods of time, flooding was caused as the Yockanookany River overran its banks, flooding some local agricultural land. From about midnight Saturday until 4:30 a.m. Sunday, Highway 19 at County Road 3020 was underwater.
The Big Black River at west is also well above flood stage (15 feet), cresting at nearly 21 feet on Tuesday.
Although the flood waters have begun to recede, Townsend said he is concerned about new issues arising this thursday, when the area is expected to experience another round of significant rainly weather.
“I’m a little worried about the front that is coming in here on thursday,” Townsend said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “We’re in monitoring mode right now and we’ll have a conference call with the weather service probably Wednesday.”
Tornado siren problems revealed
The stormy weather revealed problems with tornado sirens in both Ethel and McCool Saturday night, although both did go off when triggered by officials.
The Ethel siren, equipped with both electrical and battery power, only goes off when receiving electric power. It does not function during testing of battery-only power, according to Townsend.
“Ethel is not functioning on our monthly tests due to power issues,” said Townsend. “It works if it has electrical power, but the battery is not properly powering it if there is no electricity.”
The McCool siren system goes off, but quits after less than 45 seconds.
Townsend said he has called in a service company to evaluate the local systems and will plan for repair from that point, he said.
Townsend said area residents should always have multiple means of receiving emergency notifications.
One free service is the Red Alert system, which can be downloaded onto and operated on mobile phones free of charge.
The Attala County website has a link to the app at https://public.coderedweb.com/CNE/en-US/BFB7CC4C6C0A
