Shelter Plan
An AI severe-weather companion that, during a tornado warning, tells you exactly what to do in the next 60 seconds based on where you are — at home, in a car, at work, with kids, or in a mobile home — instead of leaving you to translate a polygon warning into action.
Households in tornado-prone regions of the US Midwest and South who feel under-served by weather alert apps
- Location-aware action plan that adapts to your building type, time of day, and who is with you (kids, elderly, pets)
- Family check-in prompts that automatically draft a text to your emergency contacts with your shelter status
- Post-storm checklist for damage assessment, utility shutoff, and insurance documentation once the warning expires
- Quiet-hours mode that escalates only for tornado-tagged alerts and silences routine thunderstorm notifications
Local tornado warnings consistently spike to hundreds of thousands of searches during outbreaks; existing apps deliver the warning but skip the 'now what' step that determines safety.
226+ tornado alert apps exist on iOS and multiple 'best of' lists are maintained, indicating ongoing search interest, but demand is event-driven (outbreaks) rather than habitual and concentrated in a seasonal/Midwest-South geographic slice.226+ Best Tornado Warning Alerts Apps for iPhone (2026) | Free & Paid ↗Our 6 Favorite Tornado Alert Apps of 2026 - Lifewire ↗
Alert-app category is crowded (TornadoPath, Clime, NOAA Weather Alerts, RadarScope), but the 'AI-driven situational what-to-do in 60 seconds by location' angle is largely unoccupied; static safety guides on weather.gov and tornadopath.com exist but don't personalize to user's situation in real time.What to do During a Tornado - National Weather Service ↗Tornado Safety — What To Do During a Tornado Warning | Tornado Path ↗
TornadoPath offers PRO premium (phone-call/SMS/email alerts) and other apps charge modest fees, but NOAA provides free authoritative alerts, anchoring willingness-to-pay low; seasonal/infrequent use further compresses LTV for subscription models.Tornado Tracker by TornadoPath - Apps on Google Play ↗
Peer-reviewed Nature/npj study and Investigate Midwest reporting show tornado frequency shifting eastward into the Mid-South/Dixie Alley and severe-weather risk persisting or growing, supporting a multi-decade use case for safety guidance tools.GRAPHIC: Tornados are increasing in frequency across the US ↗The regionality and seasonality of tornado trends in the United States ↗
Public NWS warning-polygon feeds, GPS/location APIs, and off-the-shelf LLMs make a location-aware 'what to do now' companion straightforward; TornadoPath and similar apps already demonstrate the alert pipeline is buildable by small teams.Tornado Tracker Android App | Google Play | Tornado Path ↗