When I first started working with FEMA after the 1999 tornado outbreak that hit Oklahoma and Kansas, it was amazing the things that people were calling “tornado shelters”. My eyes were opened when a FEMA representative showed me a picture of a “shelter” that consisted of this huge, salvaged steam boiler that some genius gutted, cut a hole in the side, welded on a couple of hinges to create an access door and called it a shelter. Now mind you, the boiler was cylinder shaped as you would imagine. This “genius” did NOT anchor this shelter to the ground! In an event, this would not be a shelter, at that point, it is a BAD, BAD carnival ride! Therein lies the basis for the FEMA P-361, ICC-500, and the National Storm Shelter Association (NSSA). It was to give guidance to people to create actual tornado safe rooms/shelters, one’s that could withstand the brunt of an extreme tornadic event and provide what FEMA has quoined “near-absolute” protection.
Well, unfortunately, there continues to be those “geniuses” out there that want to pick and choose what elements they follow from the guide documents/standards and are producing nothing but bad carnival rides. So what the heck does this have to do with retrofitting a building to create a tornado shelter? Well it is about a false sense of security, it is about telling someone they have a safe room/shelter when they really don’t!
I’ve heard a lot of talk out there about retrofitting existing buildings to serve as a shelter/safe room to a level that may resist EF1-3 which may cover in the neighborhood of 98% of the tornadoes. But what about the other roughly 2% that may strike a school when it is in session? Is this going to be OK if those children parish because someone decided to roll the dice with their lives and retrofit a building to the EF1-3 events when in fact the school maybe located in a 250 mph wind zone? What about the shelter/safe room that is designed and retrofitted to withstand the EF1-3 only to find out that some of the assumptions that the designer made about the construction of the existing building was in fact wrong due to field changes or poor workmanship? Isn’t this giving people a false sense of security by telling them that it is a “shelter” when it really may not be one, again the basis for guidelines and standards?
Retrofitting and/or down grading tornado shelters/safe rooms is an EXTREMELY “slippery slope” for EVERYONE involved including but not limited to building owners, designers, contractors, and especially end users. It is a situation that I personally, as a designer, have stayed away from because the outcome is potentially a lose/lose. In my humble opinion, the words “lose” and “tornado safe room/shelter” should not be used in the same sentence. Losing a child in a retrofitted school tornado shelter/safe room that has been designed only for an EF1-3 tornado is NOT an option in my book! Is something better than nothing? Is a bicycle with only one wheel better than no bicycle at all? I will let you answer those questions for yourself.
Be careful out there!