Severe Weather Awareness Week - April of each year.
Cities in Dakota County utilize outdoor warning sires for the following purposes:
- Testing – 1st Wednesday of each month at 1 p.m.
- Tornado warnings and severe thunderstorm warnings with sustained winds of 70 mph or greater
- Major hazardous material spill
- Nuclear power plant incident
When residents hear the sirens, they are urged to seek shelter and turn on a radio or TV for emergency information. When the sirens are sounding for severe weather, the radio or TV announcements will provide you with information regarding the type of storm and appropriate safety actions. The warning sirens located in Hastings are activated through the Dakota Communications Center (DCC).
Warning sirens do not sound for the duration of the threat, sirens will sound for 3 minutes. Sirens can be reactivated if a new threat enters the area following the initial warning. The outdoor warning sirens are never used to announce an "all clear." This announcement is made only over radio or TV.
The outdoor warning sirens are designed to warn people outdoors to seek shelter and gather additional information through television or radio. The city encourages all residents to use NOAA weather radios for receiving warnings in their homes. Weather radios with Specific Alert Message Encoding (SAME) can be programmed to only activate for warnings in Dakota County. The Dakota County SAME code is 027037. Weather radios are the best warning method for storms occurring late at night when most people are in their homes sleeping. NOAA weather radios can be purchased at most electronics stores. For additional information on weather radios go to: https://www.weather.gov/nwr/
