Local Students Go Through Tornado Drills to be Prepared

It’s Tornado Preparedness Week and local students are learning exactly what do in case one forms on the Coast.

A tornado is a rare occurrence on the Gulf Coast, but if one happens to form, these students know exactly what to do. Steven Huckabee, a student at Orange Grove Elementary, says, "We sit against the wall and we put our hands over our heads."

Kayden Breedlove, another student, says, "If any of the debris falls, we’ll have protection against our heads."

The staff at Orange Grove Elementary School makes sure to keep up with tornado drills to ensure the safety of their students. Dr. Tenisha Temple, Principal of Orange Grove Elementary, says, “It could happen to us and that’s something we communicate, that it’s important and that we should take it seriously, so every time they come out, it could be a hurricane, it could be a tornado, it could be fire. We treat every drill as if it were the real thing."

Residents on the Coast are used to seeing more hurricanes than tornadoes, but the students at Orange Grove Elementary sure know a lot about them. Huckabee also says, "An updraft comes up and then a downdraft comes down through the cloud, and then it touches down, and there’s a spiral of horizontal wind spin."

Breedlove says, "And since the downdraft is pulling down the tornado, the winds, they pull it towards the ground and as it touches the ground, the debris goes up and it makes the tornado darker in color."

It’s not just tornadoes the school prepares for. Jodi Waldrip, a teacher at Orange Grove Elementary, closes, "We practice tornado drills. We practice fire drills. We also practice earthquake drills and intruder drills."