Wednesday night, August 21st, many residents of Osage County were awakened just after midnight by tornado sirens. No, there was not a tornado threat in the area. Osage County Emergency Management Director, Greg McCurdy says a computer glitch caused the sirens to blare across the entire county. He says the issue was caused when dispatchers attempted to page out for a medical call. Dispatchers can page multiple departments at once, a technique called ‘stacking tones’. Each of the first responders have a preset tone and when they hear theirs, they know it’s their call. However, when dispatchers sent out the medical call, it also triggered the tornado sirens. McCurdy says the county had just performed a siren test earlier in the day. He added that if something like this happens, and there haven’t been any warnings or alerts from the National Weather Service, you can check with your local police department or county dispatchers to see if it’s a credible alarm.
