Let's taco bout how unhelpful this graphic is
and a few alternative suggestions
It’s Severe Storms Awareness Week in Maryland, and when this posts, I will be participating in the Great Maryland Twister Test, a statewide tornado drill. That is all the news hook I need to unload about something I find annoying in the general field of severe weather preparedness.1
Without further ado, here it is:
Journalists and emergency managers across the country are obsessed with this “taco watch/taco warning” business and its various spinoffs. Crab cakes from the Maryland Emergency Management Association, tenderloin sandwiches from the Indianapolis Star2, generic sandwiches from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, crabs from the Maryland Department of Emergency Management, burgers from the city of Norfolk, VA, crab cakes from Baltimore County Emergency Management, and so forth. Wisconsin picked the old-fashioned as their “staple” to assemble ingredients for.3 (International bonus: Indian tacos from the Saskatoon Tribal Council.)
Weather Brad chimes in from Charlotte, NC to inform us that “there should be no confusion with this example” of cupcakes. Thanks, Brad!
There’s only one problem: absolutely none of these help anyone remember which word goes with which type of alert. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who had trouble understanding the difference between the concept of a watch and the concept of a warning. Anyone who’s stepped outside and thought “Man, it looks like it might rain soon” or “Feels like a thunderstorm” understands the idea of favorable conditions for a weather event that hasn’t happened yet. What trips people up is that either name could plausibly refer to either concept. I spent most of my childhood thinking that a watch was the more urgent one, because first they warn you that you might be in danger, and then when a tornado actually appears, they watch it. Get it? Because you can’t actually watch something that doesn’t exist yet?
All of this could have been avoided in the first place by naming them “hazard potential warning” and “seek shelter alert” or something like that, but I would settle for a better mnemonic.
Reddit user juniperesque points out that a WATCH means you have TIME to prepare. Personally, I like a goofy lil rhyme, like
We WATCH to see
If a tornado there will be.
When we issue a WARNING,
a tornado’s already been forming!
or
WATCH and look out
To see what may come about.
WARN the people very loud
If you see the scary cloud.
or, if you really need a food metaphor,
If you hear a WATCH, just WATCH and wait
But when you hear a WARNING, there’s a tornado on your plate!
Please share your suggestions in the comments or by email reply.
I am specifically not using the recent tornados because those have killed a lot of people and this is a silly post.
By the way, this sandwich looks completely insane but it’s really good. Not as good as crab cakes, obviously, sorry Indiana, but very good. Husband, if you’re reading this, you should make them again.
Wisconsin, are you okay?
In haiku form:
Watch what develops:
It may be only nothing.
If not, take warning.
When the meteorologist is also a metaphysician:
Potential weather earns a watch;
Our response is nothing much.
Actual storms call forth a warning,
Which we heed at night or morning.