Although most people haven’t been whisked away to Oz by a tornado or seen a cow fly inches away from their vehicle, local officials say it is important to know what to do when severe weather hits.

“Usually in mid-April, we get our first severe weather outbreak in Iowa,” said Adam Frederick, senior in meteorology. “It’s the perfect time to start talking about severe weather and refresh people’s minds so they can be prepared.”

This week, which is Severe Weather Awareness Week, the National Weather Service has designated each day to concentrate on one aspect of inclement weather, said Janis Diehl, Story County Emergency Management assistant coordinator. Topics include thunderstorms, high winds, radio technology, tornadoes, flooding and terminology.

Today, there will be a simulated tornado watch and warning for participating schools and businesses in Story County at about 10 a.m. The practice warning gives officials a chance to test sirens and equipment and lets the Story County Emergency Management know if there are malfunctions, Diehl said.

“It’s a hectic couple minutes, but it’s worth it,” she said. “We can better be prepared if we have a severe storm; we know what to do.”

Last year, a couple of sirens didn’t go off due to mechanical difficulties and human error and were fixed before the severe storm season started in full force, Diehl said.

This spring has been very dry so far because of the La Ni¤a phenomenon, but there should be some severe storms starting in early April and lasting until June, said Frederick, president of the ISU chapter of the American Meteorological Society.

“But of course, we’ll have to wait and see,” Frederick said.