The Bartholomew County Operations Center and emergency management officials have tweaked the Bartholomew County-Columbus Everbridge notification system after some residents reported receiving more than a dozen warnings during Friday night’s thunderstorms.
Willie Casey of Columbus said she received as many as 15 calls and an untold number of voice mail messages and texts as a severe thunderstorm rolled across Bartholomew County, although the messages were the same.
“I finally had to unplug all the phones and then they left voice mails,” Casey said. “I’d weather the storm rather than have to go through this.”
Julie Pierce, acting director for the operations center, said each of the Everbridge notifications was a direct warning from the National Weather Service sent out each time the storm changed direction or a warning was extended.
Officials have tweaked the notification system so that continuing warnings will not be sent out repeatedly to individuals, which will eliminate the continuous phone calls during a storm. When a warning is continuing, residents shouldn’t get a repeat Everbridge notification, she said.
