A free Skywarn weather-spotting class will be offered 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Thursday at the Little River County Courthouse annex at 271 W. Main St. in Ashdown, Ark.
Skywarn is a National Weather Service volunteer program with 350,000 to 400,000 trained severe-weather spotters. The volunteers help keep their communities safe by providing timely and accurate reports of severe weather to NWS.
The main responsibility of a Skywarn spotter is to identify and describe severe local storms. In the average year, 10,000 severe thunderstorms, 5,000 floods and more than 1,000 tornadoes occur across the United States.
NWS encourages anyone with an interest in public service and access to communication such as ham radio to join the Skywarn program. Volunteers include police and fire personnel, dispatchers, emergency medical services workers, public utility workers and other concerned private citizens. Those affiliated with hospitals, schools, churches or nursing homes or who have a responsibility for protecting others are also encouraged to become spotters.