MT. VERNON, IL (WSIL) -- Officials with the Jefferson County Emergency Management Agency want you to be prepared for the possibility of a disaster hitting our area.
"Disasters can come in two versions," said Jefferson County Emergency Management Coordinator, Steven L. Leuker. "You have the natural and you have manmade."
With weather, we're talking about a natural disaster and when severe weather is expected, Leuker says that usually means there's time to prepare.
"We do work very closely with the National Weather Service," he said.
Because of its location, agents in Jefferson County work closely with the National Weather Service out of Paducah and St. Louis.
"We're out on the edge of the radar range, for Paducah," Leuker explains. "So we're kind of out on the northwest corner. And so we would work very closely with those people and stay in tune."
The team has two roles when it comes to preparing for storms. Beforehand, Leuker says it's their job to coordinate with other agencies like police, fire, and often the water department.
"If anything is preparing to happen, we're getting notification of a conference call or anything, we contact all of our local partners and let them know."
One issue these storms could cause is with timing as they're expected to hit during a time when people might be sleeping.
"We always make an effort to... tell people to have more methods of being able to receive your weather reporting," Leuker stresses. "You've got television, you've got the radio. Okay, you've got both of those available. We highly suggest that everybody have a weather radio."
Leuker has been in the game for a while so he's seen has technology has helped make these reports show up in real-time.
"When we first started, we had to type everything into it manually," he said. "Now because of the new technology involved, it picks the weather-related issues up and just automatically broadcasts them out to the general public."
