Air Siren Just Scared me into reality!!!

I had seen the time of the post, but, thought maybe she was relating something from earlier in the day...

I was just sitting on my couch reading a thread and I heard a terrifying noise. An air siren was going off.

You should read the posts.

Have a great crisis !

??????????? what im sure she / he really enjoyed it.

[edit on 1-5-2009 by theflashor]

reply to post by defcon5


It is a tornado warning siren.

When I first moved here it scared the crap out of me. I asked and was told what it was.

reply to post by jd140


Wow, and they test it everyday…
I’d say you must live in a pretty paranoid town, or someone likes to play with the system.
I’d be complaining to someone if I had to hear that sound everyday. Besides it would make folks to accustomed to it, and actually decrease their effectiveness.

reply to post by defcon5


I should clarify that it is not tested during rain storms or if storms are 50 miles from us.

For the most part even if it does go off during storms they are ignored. It is just to let us know that there is one in our county. If there is one within 10 miles of us then the other siren I described goes off.

People take the second one seriously. The first just sends us outside to look at the sky.

If you lived in Tornado Ally long enough then you really don't need a siren to tell you to take shelter.

maybe it was a smoke alarm..where you taking hallucinagetic drugs that may have made it seem more real? I don'tmean to offend, but maybe that may have made you over-react...That is pretty crazy...I hear police sirens and alarms near my house only once a month, that must have been real scary...and i live in the bronx

lol i doubt he/she is stupid, you would know the differance to the sounds still

flashor...are u suuuuure??? lol

i did use the word doubt lol,

If you lived in Tornado Ally long enough then you really don't need a siren to tell you to take shelter.

I second that. I've lived in tornado alley for over 30 years now. The local weather guys are on tv before the sirens are sounded so I'm outside looking for it.

Here they test the sirens in the city every monday @9am unless its cloudy in the spring and summer.

here were live is the largest city in the county but we are not the county seat so the city handles everything inside the city limits but that might not be the case were you live.

OP for information for your area call the county or city emergency management office they will be able to tell you.

suggestion - stop taking acid, it will make the invisible sirens dissapear

any news on what it was see you havnt posted since the panic, please let us know,
all is good,

[edit on 2-5-2009 by theflashor]

reply to post by Hx3_1963


Well nothing surfaced, though it is raining and humid out. I've never heard of a tornado up here though, so I guess I'll have to wait till the morning to call and find out.

I'm happy that it was nothing (so far), but in a weird way, I'm happy it happened because it really woke me up to the facts of how quick something can go wrong and how fast you have to move.. Thanks for all the replies on where to go and not to go. I really appreciate the help everyone

We had sirens going off here tonight as well (Pittsburgh area). It is pretty common for the thunderstorms that we got today at least in this area. Both fire departments that I pass by coming home for work were out and about so I assume some lightning caused some fires.

In France we have air sirens going off every first wednesday of the month, at 12.00 , since 50 years or something.

Some guy in my hometown was doing some maintenance on the local siren and it went off in the middle of the afternoon on a Sunday...I saw a couple of heads at the windows, but nothing more. That tells me a lot about the ""average"" initial reaction when an alarm goes off. Not a single panic move, from anybody...

I used to live on a U.S. base in Europe and sometimes we'd here sirens going off as well.

Just like you, I was freaked out and it got me thinking. What if a real situation occurs? Anything could happen today or tomorrow. Anything. Especially in these difficult times.

considering the time.. I hardly believe this was a test miss. I have been in the US now for some 4 years. its been my experience that these sirens are tested at lunchtime. Not at 21:00. going off the time of your thread and how it was stated you JUST heard it, you may want to check into this.

Another interesting possibility is that it could have been one of the fanatics who actually love air raid sirens and similar equipment. Hop onto youtube and search for air raid siren and you will find several pages of people testing ones they have bought at auction or on the internet, etc. It would seem that there is a very unique crowd with a fascination of such siren and its completely possible that someone in your area was simply unboxing their latest find and decided to hook it up.

Know the feeling. So a siren goes off..then what? Where do you go? What do you do?

Just the other day, during a slight storm our county sirens went off. Now as I understand it, the siren during a storm is used to mean 1.) thunderstorm warning and 2.) tornado warning. Same siren...two different meanings. There may be other "meanings" but I sure don't know them. So when it went off, based on what the weather was doing, I said to myself...oh thunderstorm warning...weird...it's just a gentle rain.

What I generally do at this point is listen to the weather radio or flip on the TV. And just as I was about to do that, thinking wow this siren's a lot longer than usual, there was a huge difference...a booming male voice said, "A funnel cloud is in the area...seek shelter immediately!" It talked! I had never heard this before even during tornado warnings! So my heart skipped a few beats and I beat it to the basement with the dogs and turned on the TV there.

Nothing. No mention. No scrolls. Well about an hour later, local news cut in and said, "There is no tornado or funnel cloud or even thunderstorm in your area...we don't know WHY the sirens went off...we just wanted to tell people not to worry." Freaking weird. Not another word. Nothing on the news. No one at the county offices knew why this happened when I called. I looked at the website and found this...

The county will sound these sirens for three to five minutes when:

* The National Weather Service issues a severe thunderstorm warning with a tornado watch.
* The National Weather Service issues a tornado warning.
* A tornado has been spotted or reported by public safety officials.
* Additional weather warnings are issued.
* National Security events.
* Hazardous material incidents where evacuation or other action may be warranted.

Several sirens have the capability of broadcasting voice messages.

The majority of sirens will not specify the type of storm or emergency; therefore, you need to tune into your local radio or television station for further information.

Pretty worthless.

The other weird thing is that Comcast here, for the past year, has been doing "monthly" tests of the EAS about 5 times a WEEK. So everytime THAT goes off I jump too. It kind of annoys me to look up and see that it's a monthy test AGAIN.

I had that happen to me just recently. I had just come home from shopping and was getting everything out of the car when I heard the Siren go off in Lillington. The problem was that it wasnt cloudy so I knew it wasnt a tornado warning. And we do live close to the nuclear plant so I was running in the house and turning on the TV. But they said nothing at all on there. Even when the news came on they said nothing. The Siren went for close to 10 minutes then shut off.

Hubby says its the state testing them to make sure they work. But they have been doing them lately every 4 days. So it makes me wonder why they are doing it. They havent done it for 4 1/2 years why now?