Chris Schillig: Ignoring the tornado warning

I spent Thursday night’s tornado warning teaching a class at an area community college. 

The room had windows and was on the second floor. The only thing worse would have been to teach on the roof. Nothing about my decision was safe or smart. 

It wasn’t like I didn’t know about the warning. Driving to class, I heard the high-pitched, ear-shattering alarm from my cell phone. Minutes later, I drove through a band of strong rain and wind. 

At some point in the commute, my wife called to warn me. She and the dog headed to the basement, where she provided blow-by-blow recaps from whatever TV station she was watching. The meteorologist named specific streets and businesses in our neighborhood that were receiving the worst of the wind and rain. 

I kept driving. 

If I were home, I would have joined them downstairs. These days, we are pretty conscientious about listening for weather warnings and following directions. 

I wasn’t always. I used to be a porch gawker, the kind of person who wanders outside and looks up during a tornado warning, like a chicken that is too dumb not to drown while staring up at a rainstorm. 

I’m not sure what changed me. Chalk it up to the love of a good woman or a lower tolerance for risk as I age. 

But on Thursday night, all that went out the window — not literally, thank goodness. 

I suppose my sense of duty overshadowed my common sense. In reality, though, nothing I was doing Thursday night — lecturing on argumentation, leading a discussion — was so important that it couldn’t wait. 

I wasn’t performing brain surgery or dragging unconscious people out of a burning building. I was teaching composition, for heaven’s sake. 

Here’s where I share the “do what I say, not what I do (did)” stuff: 

In a tornado warning, head to the lowest part of whatever building you are in, preferably a basement, as far away from windows as possible. 

Once there, get under something sturdy, like a table. Cover your head. Head trauma is the most common type of injury during a tornado. Some doctors even recommend wearing a helmet, but I can hear readers rolling their eyes from here. 

If you are driving, pull over, get below the window line, keep your seatbelt buckled, and cover your head. It’s difficult to outrun a tornado; they’re fast. 

Decades ago, a colleague spent a tornado warning up in a tree, building his kids’ treehouse. He said he heard the leaves shaking, but otherwise didn’t know the weather was so dangerous. Nobody told him, he said. 

These days, the prevalence of technology makes it less likely that people won’t know about dangerous weather. Everything beeps and buzzes and screeches, multiple times, loudly. 

Still, all that marvelous tech is worthless if we ignore it, like I did Thursday. 

Later that night, after the warning had expired and class was dismissed, I opened emails from several students who apologized for missing class. 

I was stuck at home during the tornado warning, one said. Another said she went to pick up her children from daycare and stayed right there, where they were all relatively safe. 

I applauded them all for being smarter than their teacher. 

chris.schillig@yahoo.com

@cschillig on Twitter