Storm Spotter Aleshia

Severe Weather Preparedness 101, Part 1- know your location. I can’t stress enough how important it is to know where you are and where you are in relation to where the storms are. The United States is approximately 3.797 million square miles which is divided into 50 states, and each of the states are then divided into counties.  It is very important to know what county you live in, where you are in that county, and what the surrounding counties are.  For example, I know that I am in Bryan County, OK. I know that I have Atoka County to my north, Choctaw County to my east, Marshall County to my west, and Johnston County to my northwest. And since I live so close to the Texas border, I know that Grayson County is to my south and southwest, and Fannin County is to my southeast.  Knowing where you are helps when looking at radar, knowing what the radar means does nothing to help you if you don’t know where in the state you are.  Knowing your counties and surrounding count...

  I will be sharing a series of blogs about what to do in preparation for severe weather. Most of these are things you need to start on now, before severe weather hits so that you are prepared when severe weather strikes.  This series is meant to be easy to understand and follow, and each one will build off of the previous blog. So they will get a bit more complex as we go along. The hope is that this blog series is simple enough that anyone can understand it.  So far I have the following blogs planned: 1. Know Your Location 2. Know Your National Weather Service Office 3. NOAA and Weather Radios 4. To shelter in place or to go to another place to shelter? 5. Convective Outlook 6.  Watches, Warnings, and Advisories 7. Radar- What is radar and how does it work? As I get these written and posted I will come back here and make links to that post so check back. Also, if I think of anything else to add to this collection (and I probably will) I will come back an...

  About Me My name is Aleshia and I am a trained SkyWarn Storm Spotter. I have been obsessed with storms ever since I was a little kid. I grew up in the Oklahoma City area, and anytime there was a storm, my stepdad and I would stand on the porch and watch the storms. He taught me about wall clouds, funnel clouds, lightning, storm development, and things of that nature.  Living in Oklahoma City, I also grew up watching Gary England on the TV anytime severe weather would happen, and he was great at showing what different things meant and talking about what was happening. He very quickly became someone I looked up to. As a young kid, I wanted to be a meteorologist just like Gary England. I obsessed over storms, sometimes to the point where my parents thought I was afraid of them because I would watch storm coverage even when they were nowhere near us, I just liked watching and learning.  By middle school, I knew I wanted to be a storm chaser. I knew it was dangerous, but I w...