Louisville Community Safe Room
Aerial view of the Louisville Community Safe Room in Louisville, Mississippi. The Monolithic Dome serves as a community center, activity facility, and shelter-in-place storm shelter.
The Louisville Community Safe Room is a FEMA P-361 and ICC 500 rated storm shelter that can protect up to 2,218 people during severe weather. It is also a community center for the city of Louisville, Mississippi. During the school year, it is used as an activity center for two adjacent elementary schools. Private organizations can also rent the facility for their own events.
The Monolithic Dome is 127-feet (38.7 m) diameter by 26-feet (7.9 m) tall on top of a 14-foot (4.3 m) block stem wall. It encompasses 12,670 square feet (1,177 m²), as mostly a single, large room with restrooms and storages on one side. All doors are storm rated and open when there is a tornado warning.
The shelter was built in response to an EF-4 tornado on April 28, 2014, that left 30 miles of devastation across Winston County and killed 10 people. The Louisville received about 85 percent of the funding from FEMA and from MEMA—the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.