St. Louis tornado: Emergency management chief sent on leave over non-activation of sirens

The mayor of St. Louis has sent the city's emergency management chief on administrative leave, over non-activation of warning sirens ahead of a deadly tornado last week.Sarah Russell, the commissioner of the City Emergency Management Agency (CEMA), will remain on paid administrative leave as an external investigation is conducted into what went wrong, mayor Cara Spencer's office announced on Tuesday, according to CBS News.The tornado, which struck St. Louis on May 16, claimed at least five lives in this major city of the US' Missouri province.Spencer described it as "one of the worst storms, absolutely." What went wrong?As per the news outlet, St. Louis has 60 outdoor sirens which must be activated once the National Weather Service (NWS) issues a tornado warning for the area as it did last Friday. These can be activated only from two places: the CEMA office and the Fire Department. According to the mayor office, Russell, the emergency commissioner, was at an offsite workshop with other emergency management staff when the tornado warning came down. This prevented them from activating the sirens from their agency's main building, about a half mile away. Russell instead contacted the Fire Department, but the directive was "ambiguous." Spencer's office released the recording of this call, in which Russell confirms being aware of the NWS warning before saying, "OK, you got the sirens?" The person at the other end replies, "Yes, ma'am," and the call ends.

"The direction was not clear. Russell did not clearly direct the person at the Fire Department to press the button to activate the sirens. It's my understanding that the button was not pushed," Spencer said at a news conference Wednesday morning about the phone call.However, it was found that the button had already not been working. Work to repair it is underway and is expected to be completed within days.On the other hand, the button at the CEMA office was functioning. Fire Department personnel will now be stationed there 24/7 to activate the sirens when needed.St. Louis fire chief John Walk will serve as the interim emergency management commissioner until a permanent appointment is made.