"Don't know why, There's no sun up in the sky, Stormy weather."
 
The high winds, stormy weather, and tornado warnings last night did not bother my son as much as the interuptions to one of his favorite television shows. I think adults took the storms more seriously.
 
The rains this morning kept our emergency responders extremely busy. Fire Chief Danny Grammer reported that from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. 12 citizens were pulled to safety from flooded areas, mainly in the southwest portion of the city. Drivers were diverted from high-water areas by numerous fire crews and police officers. The Swift-water Rescue Team pulled one person from Duck Creek.
 
There were numerous house fires as the rain fell. At least some were caused by lightening hits. In each case, swift reaction enabled fire fighters to keep the fires relatively well contained, limiting damage to the area where the fires started.
 
Also, there were numerous traffic accidents during this same period.
 
In District 1, we had a house fire off Pleasant Valley Rd.
 
Later today, unrelated to the rain, an explosion occurred off Muirfield Ave inside a house that was being painted. Both of the painters received burns and were transported to the hospital.
 
Some days are sleeping days and others are like the last 24 hours. The city's CodeRED alert system was recently upgraded to also report weather warnings. Those that had previously registered need to register again to get the additional warnings. One of the benefits is being able to give a secondary number for notification. Both will be called. So, even if you're away from your home, you can receive warnings on your mobile phone.
 
I strongly urge everyone to take the 1.23 minutes necessary to go the city's CodeRED webpage and register for the enhanced warnings. The next time we have a day like we did today, you'll wish you had. Really, it only takes a minute or two and you're done.