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INCLEMENT WEATHER SAFETY AND PLANNING

LSA as a general rule does not cancel practices or games until the actual time of the practice. There is no reason to contact your coach or club officials prior to going to the site.

Kentucky weather varies greatly and while it may be raining on Southern Middle School the sun may be out at Dutchman’s Lane. And likewise while we may have a thunderstorm at 5:30 the sun may be back out at 6:05. Practices should continue and our players should learn to deal with varying weather conditions as may be required in games.

The final decision regarding cancellation of practices shall rest with the coach. It is club policy to get kids off of the field immediately after seeing the first signs of lightening or damaging winds. You should never bring the kids back to the field until it is very apparent that the threat for additional lightening has passed.

If for some reason the field at which you train is just “unplayable”, that would mean standing water as can occur at some of our fields, or if the fields are just soaked to the point that you would really damage them by practicing, then I would suggest conditioning drills in the parking area. Canceling practice should be the last option and should not be determined until the field is visually inspected. If a practice is cancelled you should attempt to make it up at a later date.

In order to protect the kids from severe weather have a plan in mind that will protect all kids. If there are adequate numbers of parents waiting in cars the kids can get in the cars and await a ride or the end of practice. If there is no room for all the kids in cars be sure to have a safe place to retire to near your practice facility. Make sure that the team parents know where the kids will be in the event of bad weather. Following are some suggestions for our more heavily used fields:

1. Westport Middle School has many covered entrances to the school. The largest is at the front door but this is kind of far from the rear fields. Simply identify one and let your parents know where the team will be.

2. Southern Middle School has many safe exterior areas also, but the safest is probably directly adjacent to the field next to the rear building doors.

3. LSA Field at Dutchman’s Lane has no real safe area of it’s own, but we do have permission to go into the covered stairwell (emergency exit) at the end of the Twinbrook Apartments or into the front stairs of the former daycare across the street. The large apartment building offers the greatest protection.

4. Bishops Lane has no obvious “safe” area if you are unfamiliar with the complex. However, at the opposite side of the parking lot that we use is an underground covered walkway to the Vanhoose Education Building. This area should be used in bad weather.

We may need to use other areas for practice from time to time as well. Be sure to survey the area and make arrangements for cover if needed. You may occasionally use a park, as we do for conditioning, these facilities usually offer very few “safe” areas, so ask the parents to stay around if the weather is threatening. Just be sure to use proper judgment and plan your practices or events all the way through the consideration of WEATHER in that plan.