Well, if your phone is “smart,” you have a choice of weather apps that warn of tornados, flash floods, and other severe weather, with a very alarming screech.

Having been hit by the unexpected Minneapolis/St. Paul & Suburbs tornado in 1981, when the sirens went off 20 minutes after impact, we tend to keep several types of weather radios on hand.

Basements are good protection but something as simple and easy to build as a slit trench is also good protection. In some ways better than a basement because there is no house on top to dig through to get out.

Figure a classic army specification of a ditch two feet wide, three feet deep, and as long as needed given 30″ per person. Given the narrowness of the trench there is no great need for any overhead cover as wind, even a tornado, just blows over. This is an afternoon’s work with a shovel. You can work up from a simple trench by reinforcing the walls with boards so the dirt doesn’t slump into it in time and adding duckboards to keep you above any mud. A cover to keep the wain out will keep maintenance to minimum. In time you can expand it to a regular root cellar, an underground cabin, and get as hobbit-like as you care to.

Dig it one afternoon and clean it up every spring and you will have a place to go if/when you ever need it. All you need to start is a shovel and a willingness to sweat.

Alternatively, for the folks with heavy equipment, even a small backhoe could knock one out in a few minutes.

There is no reason for anyone to not have shelter.