City of Sebastian Installs New Lightning System at Barber Street Sports Complex

The City of Sebastian installed a new Thor Guard Lightning System to predict and detect lightning at the Barber Street Sports Complex.

“This system will also allow parents, coaches, and family members the opportunity to check the system before they leave to head to the park or ball field,” Sebastian Leisure Services Director Brian Benton, CPRP, told Sebastian Daily.

The system is also a weather station to provide heat warnings, weather radar, and other rainfall data. The link to the website for the Barber Street location is http://360.thormobile.net/cityofsebastian/. 

“This site could also be a great asset for the community so that the general public could use it to check on approaching storms and know when to seek shelter at home or throughout the community,” said Benton.

Here is how the system will work at the Barber Street Sports Complex:

• There is a horn and strobe light positioned on the baseball concession stand and another one on top of the skate park office (see attached pictures). Once the system registers RED Warning, the horn will sound for 15 seconds, and the strobe light will activate.
• Once the horn sounds, that is your signal to get everyone to safety. Safety is meant to be a building, inside vehicles, etc. DO NOT keep participants in the dugouts, under overhangs, or under trees once this system is activated.
• If you arrive after the warning sound has gone off, you can look to see if the strobe light is flashing. This light will flash for the duration of the Warning until safe conditions return to the facility.
• You may resume activities only after THREE (3) 5-second blasts of the horn are sounded and the strobe light stops flashing.

The system is pretty impressive, and Sebastian Daily checked out the equipment that’s been mounted on the main building near the baseball fields at the Barber Street Sports Complex.

The Skate Park office also has a satellite location with a horn and strobe light that alerts the football fields simultaneously. Benton said this was to ensure coverage throughout the entire complex, to notify everyone using the park.