ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, February 5, 1996 TAG: 9602050013
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: LEESBURG
SOURCE: Associated Press|
No doubt about it - the Leesburg Volunteer Fire Company's air raid sirens are effective.
The two sirens summon firefighters from far and near with an earsplitting wail, but also roust sleeping townspeople such as Gary Kavanagh from their beds.
``It was even louder than having a phone under your pillow,'' bemoaned Kavanagh, 52, who said he was awakened by the town's sirens as often as three times a night. ``It was very disturbing.''
But now Kavanagh can slumber in peace. Giving in to a slew of complaints, the volunteer fire department has silenced its sirens at night, ending a practice that lasted a half-century.
For two weeks, the sirens have been silent from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. on weekdays and from 7 p.m. to 9 a.m. on weekends.
Noisemakers from church bells to horns have historically alerted volunteer firefighters in small towns and rural areas. But with the proliferation of paging systems and full-time, paid firefighters, most such devices have been mothballed.
Leesburg, a fast-growing town of 20,000 that is 40 miles west of Washington, was the largest community in the Washington area to still use sirens.
Terry Frye, the town's fire chief, said the sirens were meant to wake up his firefighters in case their pagers failed to work. But he acknowledged that the wake-up calls were happening a little too often for some folks.
Emergency calls to the fire department have increased from fewer than 500 a year in the late 1980s to more than 1,100 last year. That meant more and more blasts.
``It would go off at 11 o'clock, and it would keep you awake, but when you finally got back to sleep, it would happen again at 2 and again at 5,'' said John D. Lewis, 49, a resident who crusaded against the sirens for 11 years. ``They said I should be a fireman because I woke up so often.''
Frye said the fire company has stopped using the sirens at night because four or five members have started sleeping at the station. The volunteers converted an office into a bunk room, he said.
``For the first time in years, I'm sleeping great,'' Lewis said.
So are the firefighters.
In the first week of shutting down the sirens and having the crews in the bunk room, they've received only one emergency call after 10 p.m., Frye said.
``It's strange,'' he said. ``Things seem to have gotten a lot quieter for everyone.''
LENGTH: Medium: 54 linesby CNB