Hey guys, A long time ago, i remember my firehouse (before i even joined)
used to sound the sirens, at the house, to alert firefighters to fires, i believe, and they used to do it at noon too.. But they don't do it anymore. No fire company in the area does it anymore, only for some parades. Why is this? i mean, we have pagers to alert us but didn't the sirens serve another purpose too?
I miss them, that was such a rush! :P
We have about 65+ active members and 3 stations, everyone has a pager, and every call we get the roof sirens on all three houses go off. Man they still sound great...
Our department has a large air horn that blows for every call. With that, we set it for holidays and occasions. Memorial day, 9/11, Veteran's day for example, or a number of blasts for members that pass away that coincides with their badge number. There is no noon alarm though. We carry pagers, but the horn still goes off.
Kalangadoo station still has a fire siren and we test it every wednesday night at 7pm as well as set it off when theres a shortage of crew during day time hours if our brigade has a call out plus should the town come under threat from a wildfire or the timber mill goes up then the siren would be sounded to inform of immediate evacuation
If the siren sounds about 4 minutes after the inital pager message goes out it gives people warning to stay clear of the road due to increased traffic with brigade volunteers such as myself responding to the station
Permalink Reply by Doug on March 15, 2009 at 12:44am
We dont use siren anymore we use just pagers, the sad part of the siren is that we had neighbors that complained about it. now we have neighbors complaining that we don't use it any more. we are in the process of putting it back into service. not only for emergency calls but for severe weather alert. We miss ours and yes it was an adrenline rush even when it went off at noon. ours went off at noon and six pm.
Well we just have pagers. I'm not sure if they ever used the old air-raid/tornado sirens for fire calls or not. They would not have been very good because they are only designed to be heard outside. If you are inside you can't hear them. Last month I traveled to a town for a funeral move up. They had us set their siren off when the procession went by. It will be a sound that I will never forget.
my company still has a siren, but only sounds for fire/rescue runs during daylight hours. We only have a siren at our primary station, our substation had one but the area residents complained (it's the old problem, it's always a hassle until they want us at their home). I rely on my minitor for alerts, I'm usually jumping in my Jeep by the time the house siren starts blasting. I don't think any members in our district rely on the siren except when they're doing yard work. I've heard some residents behind the station say it's a nice warning to their kids playing in the street to watch out for fire trucks and responding firefighters, though.
Our house siren used to be so loud it cracked windows at the homes right behind the station. It's been toned down a little since then. :)