June 17th Tornado in Albany County: Why Sirens Didn’t Sound

Albany County Emergency Management says its Public Warning System is "working as expected," even though no emergency sirens sounded during Tuesday afternoon's Tornado Warning.

Coordinator Kate Allred says the National Weather Service in Cheyenne issued the warning at 12:30 p.m., stating that the tornado had been spotted approximately eight miles east of Laramie and was moving northeast.

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Why Didn't the Tornado Sirens Go Off?

Allred says the warning automatically triggered their Everbridge system, which sent out an alert to 1040 contacts through their Albany County Alerts system, but it didn't automatically trigger any sirens, because it wasn't in their area of coverage.

"The activation radiuses vary throughout the County but are set between 3 and 5 miles within City of Laramie limits based on coverage area and overlap," Allred said in a public release on Thursday.

Allred says the sirens can be manually activated if there is a perceived threat in an area where one is located.

"No sirens were activated automatically or manually for this event, as the tornado was reported as 8 miles out of City limits, traveling away from town and there was no threat to the City of Laramie, or any area with an emergency siren at that time," she said.

Initial Estimation of Tornado Trajectory

Allred says after reviewing radar, reports, images, videos, and the like, the NWS is estimating that the tornado touched down southwest of Dymek Hill on Medicine Bow National Forest land, traveled across Dymek Hill, where tree damage was observed, and lifted northeast of Dymek Hill.

Allred says it's believed that the tornado was on the ground for approximately five minutes.

Allred says aside from the Tornado Warning that went through their system, 12 Severe Thunderstorm Warnings and multiple hail alerts were sent from Albany County Alerts in various affected areas throughout the county that day.

She recommends that all citizens sign up for Albany County Alerts to receive essential, life-saving notifications. To sign up, click here.