A city official has been suspended and residents are still staggering after a mortal tornado crossed St. Louis, killing five people and exposing critical failures in the city’s emergency response.
Before the devastating storm on Friday night, the city’s emergency management director Sarah Russell, could not activate tornado sirens, leaving unprepared and vulnerable residents.
Since then, the director of the city’s emergency management agency (CEMA) has been placed on a paid administrative license, Mayor Spencer’s mayor announced, saying that he wanted to ‘provide responsibility’ after the alerts of salvation of life were not implemented.
In a statement, Spencer said that Cema could not «alert the public about the dangers.»
«Commissioner Russell has served our city for years and is a person of goodwill, but I cannot pass this without providing responsibility and ensure that our emergency management is in the hands of trust,» said the mayor.
Spencer said that an internal investigation into the siren failure revealed «multiple» problems, which caused its decision to seek an external CEMA investigation.
He pointed out several details at the launch of Tuesday, including a malfunction button in the fire department to activate the sirens.
Five lives were lost in St. Louis when a powerful tornado hit the city early Friday. In the photo: People will clear their supplies the day after tornados hit the areas of St. Louis
STREET. The mayor of Louis, Cara Spence
Sarah Russell and other CEMA employees were far from their office, where another button is located to activate the sirens, although strong storms were in the forecast
Russell and other CEMA employees were far from their office, where another button is located to activate the sirens, despite the fact that strong storms were in the forecast, said Spencer.
«At that time, there was a collapse in communication,» said the statement.
«The directive to activate the sirens was ambiguous, which cannot happen when a tornado is sweeping through our city and the security of St. Louisans depends on being alerted immediately.»
Spencer then announced that John Walk, a captain of the Fire Department, will lead CEMA «until a permanent commissioner has been found.»
He also said that Michael Thiemann, head of the Division of the West Metro Fire Protection, would provide the city with an additional support for incident management. «
The city of St. Louis operates 60 sirens of warnings and an update to existing alarms is being updated. The city also has an online and text alert program, Stltoday reported.
The abused city is now struggling to build the pieces again, using volunteers, local emergency response equipment and several others.
However, the generalized effort is not enough to reduce the estimated damage of $ 1.6 billion caused by the EF-3 tornado, which, according to the reports, reduced a 23-mile path through the area, damaged more than 5,000 buildings and winds recorded up to 152 miles per hour.
Since then, the mayor has requested federal intervention, seeking help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), but the city’s help shouts have not been fulfilled.
The abused city is now struggling to build the pieces again, using volunteers, local emergency response equipment and several others. In the photo: a house collapsed in the 700 block of Aubert Ave the day after Tornados arrived in the areas of St. Louis, Missouri
But, the generalized community effort is not enough to reduce the estimated damage of $ 1.6 billion caused by the EF-3 tornado, which, according to the reports, reduced a 23-mile path through the area, damaged more than 5,000 buildings and registered winds of up to 152 miles per hour.
Spencer said on social networks that although the city is actively working with state and federal authorities to obtain Fema resources, it could take weeks to arrive. Photo: Jerikah McCloud looks at the second floor destroyed from his family home in the neighborhood of the St. Louis Academy, Missouri
‘At the local level, each organization, member of the community, elected official, has been successful. What we need at this time is federal assistance, ‘Spencer told MSNBC. «For this is the federal government.»
Spencer said on social networks that although the city is actively working with state and federal authorities to obtain Fema resources, it could take weeks to arrive.
FEMA does not provide assistance automatically after a storm or disaster, its presence must be requested by the State, he said.
On Monday, the governor of Missouri, Mike Kehoe, asked President Donald Trump to issue a federal emergency statement and requested that FEMA participate in assessments of preliminary joint damage, said USATODAY.
The next day, Senator Josh Hawley pushed the Secretary of National Security, Kristi Noem, to receive the request for Friday’s storm and two other disaster declaration requests without response to Trump as soon as possible.
«We are desperate for attendance at Missouri,» he said.
Noem promised to bring the disaster statements to Trump and accelerate FEMA assistance once he approves them.
However, many online are skeptical of federal agencies, since Missouri is still waiting for a response to requests for federal disasters related to storms, tornadoes or floods on March 14 and 15, March 30 to April 8 and April 29, according to the governor’s office.
Fema does not provide assistance automatically after a storm or disaster; The State must request its presence. In the photo: a woman looks through a pile of bricks and rubble, standing where a house stopped once after a tornado in St. Louis, Missouri,
Rescue teams sift through the debris after the deadly tornado EF-3
A man works inside his damaged house caused by a tornado in St. Louis, Missouri
Many online are skeptical of federal agencies, since Missouri is still waiting for an answer to requests for federal disasters related to storms, tornadoes or floods on March 14 and 15, March 30 to April 8 and April 29, according to the governor’s office.
‘Then, a tornado of 23 miles long x 1 mile width harvest the destruction through a densely populated area in St Louis mo and without response FEMA, what does it give?’ A user wrote on X, previously Twitter, labeling the president and other elected officials.
Another labeled the president, claiming that residents are ‘asking for’ federal intervention.
‘@realdonaldtrump We need boots on the ground that people ask for help in St Louis Missouri because it has not even declared an emergency state yet and there is still no FEM or the Red Cross there.
Another user labeled the Federal Emergency Management Agency directly, asking for help: ‘@FEMA, any aid for the expected St Louis? Anyone who has had a week of bad weather, really, but the densely populated external city areas are many people without a home and there is probably no tornado insurance coverage, «the user wrote.
In recent weeks, it is believed that at least 2,000 of the 6,100 full -time employees of FEMA were left or planned to leave the Federal Agency due to voluntary terminations and retirements ordered by the Efficiency Department of the Government of Elon Musk.
More dismissals are expected in the coming weeks as the Trump administration review of Fema continues.
(Tagstotranslate) Dailymail
