Where tornado sirens exist across Florida

While tornado sirens are a staple across communities in the Midwest and Plains, most cities in Florida have never installed them, instead relying on mobile alerts, NOAA Weather Radios, media and other methods to get information out about dangerous storms.

According to the Storm Prediction Center, between 50 and 60 tornadoes strike the Sunshine State every year, with some counties having a higher frequency of twisters than Oklahoma.

Despite the frequency, only around a handful of communities have sirens devoted to alerting the public to tornadoes.

Outside of university settings such as Florida State University and the University of South Florida, which use sirens for a variety of emergency incidents, the town of Oviedo, northeast of Orlando, was one of the first to install dedicated tornado sirens in 2007.

According to Lisa McDonald, the communications manager for the City of Oviedo, with a growing population and success with the system’s first ten sirens, the city installed an eleventh siren years later that helps to cover more than 15 square miles.

Similar smaller cities such as Winter Park in Orange County and Melrose in Putnam County have followed suit, but many other communities have simply shied away from installation, citing the cost, ongoing maintenance and whether newer technologies have replaced the nearly age-old system.

“I think it’s cost prohibitive. I don’t think it’s going to be effective. I think it’s going to expose us to liability. God forbid something did happen. Fortunately for us out here, we really haven’t had much in the way of tornadoes…And if you’re living in a mobile home and that thing goes off, what are you going to do? Where are you going to run,” Mayor Carmine Dipaolo of the Village of Indiantown said during a council meeting earlier this year.

The village is located in Martin County and not far from where several tornadoes struck during Hurricane Milton’s outer bands in 2024.

At least six people were killed during the tornado outbreak and damage figures topped more than half a billion dollars, according to NOAA estimates.

Following the tornadoes, heightened interest in storm preparedness led council members and residents to ask whether the community could do more to get ready for severe weather – a notion many agreed on, though not to the extent of investing in an expensive siren network.

Emergency managers in other jurisdictions estimate the price tag of installing just one new siren to be around $30,000 to $50,000, meaning an entire network could cost in the range of six to seven figures.

Officials in the town of Melrose in Putnam County were able to defray much of their initial costs by rehabbing an old siren that was originally used to alert volunteer firefighters of the need for their response before pagers were readily available.

The siren has been used several times, including during hurricane strikes along the Gulf Coast, when the peninsula usually finds itself in the front, right quadrant of a cyclone, which is known to produce the highest frequency of tornadoes.

Most tornadoes that strike the Sunshine State are on the weaker end of the Enhanced Fujita Scale and are given ratings between EF0–EF2, but even with the low-end wind speeds they can still be quite dangerous and catch residents off guard.

That’s why emergency managers and meteorologists with the seven National Weather Service offices that serve the state’s 67 counties stress that residents, even those living within earshot of a severe weather siren, need to have several ways to receive warnings.

“Do not solely rely on the activation of the outdoor siren to make a decision,” staff with the Melrose Fire Department reminds residents. “This is only part of a toolbelt to assist with keeping you safe.”

An easy way to be alerted to Tornado Warnings is to ensure the Wireless Emergency Alerts feature is enabled on your cell phone and download the Florida Public Radio Emergency Network’s Florida Storms app to see the latest radar, warnings and advisories.