National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office

Wednesday March 27, 2013*

9:50 AM - Storm Prediction Center (SPC) coordinates with Iowa National Weather Service (NWS)  offices about a test tornado watch for Iowa

10:00 AM - SPC issues Test Tornado Watch for Iowa.  Each Iowa forecast office then issues a test Watch Coordination Notification message. The Test watch will be toned and alerted on NOAA All Hazards Radio and sent through the Emergency Alert System (EAS)**

10:10 AM - NWS Sioux Falls and Omaha issue test tornado warnings for their Iowa counties (western Iowa)

10:15 AM- NWS Des Moines and Quad Cities issue test tornado warnings for their Iowa counties (central, southeast, east-central Iowa)

10:20 AM - NWS La Crosse issues test tornado warning for their Iowa counties (northeast Iowa)

10:30-10:35 AM - All Iowa NWS offices issues a Severe Weather Statement to expire the test warnings.

11:00 AM - Test tornado watch expires.

* If severe weather threatens on Wednesday March, 27th, the test will be conducted on Thursday - March 28th following the same schedule. 

** The FCC prohibits the use of live Emergency Alert System (EAS) warning codes for test messages.  A waiver has been requested from the FCC which would authorize the use of real TOR EAS/NOAA Weather Radio codes for the test.  We thank the Iowa EAS Chairmen for requesting the waiver for the test.  The use of the "live" code will depend on receipt of this waiver. 

Iowa Statewide Tornado Drill Timeline