Fort Stockton experienced severe weather on May 1 as the National Weather Service confirmed that three tornadoes touched down in Pecos County.

The tornadic weather affected some local areas, toppling over RVs at the Roadrunner RV Park, flipping the RV Park’s playground equipment, and tipping over two semis on I-10 near Fort Stockton.

Pecos County Emergency Management Coordinator Jessie Dominguez confirmed on Monday that no one was hurt in the incident in the county and that the RVs that flipped were vacant at the time.

Marble to baseball size hail was reported in various areas of the county with the smallest size reaching the outskirts of Fort Stockton.

Dominguez noted that the tornados were the first since before the COVID-19 pandemic began in the area in early 2020.

The City of Fort Stockton discerned that the turbulent weather warranted a reminder of the available weather notification services set in place.

In December of 2019 the city and county signed an interlocal agreement to change its weather notification services from Code Red Weather Warning to Hyper-Reach.

Hyper-Reach is a free emergency communications network that provides rapid notifications to citizens and visitors of emergencies and weatherrelated conditions.

The free notifications include fire warning, flash flood warning, severe thunderstorm warning, tornado warning and winter storm warning.

To sign up, citizens can visit both the city and county websites. On the city’s website you follow the homepage to the “departments” tab and under “police department” a direct link will take you to the free sign up for Hyper-Reach.

On the county website there is a Hyper-Reach tab that also takes you directly to the sign-up page.

The Hyper-Reach sign up page includes a smart phone QR Code that jumps directly into the three-step process. Signing up requires little information such as providing your name, location, and phone number.

In additional to Hyper-Reach, the local fire department also trains storm spotters.

The storm spotters have historically positioned themselves on the outskirts, particularly the four corners of town to assist in spotting rotations. They in turn call dispatch to report the rotation sightings prompting for the sirens to be turned on.

With three Pecos County tornadoes recently confirmed, the city and county are getting proactive in promoting their joint-service as an aid for keeping the community safe.