The reason the sirens are still up is because it would’ve been too expensive to take them down. I find that hard to believe because it’s LA but who knows. That’s just what I’ve heard. And that one that you saw moving, it was the wind. That particular model has a belt driven rotator and when the belt breaks or deteriorates it can cause the siren to rotate freely in the wind.
They're very very loud. The reason they're still standing is because to remember what happened. The siren that was rotating if it was being tested you'd hear it and it would be quite loud, so likely it was the wind. You never know though they could've just been testing the rotation mechanism.
I really enjoyed hearing your story of how you started researching into sirens. Our stories are quite similar actuallly. When I was 8 years old I used to regularily visit a park in North Vancouver BC Canada with my mom and grandparents on visits. I would regularily stroll passed a decomissioned cold war era siren. I asked a lot of the same questions you did as well. My biggest question was "how could something that was so important for the publics safety 50 years ago be left to rust and decay like this?" I'm 25 now and I have spent the majority of my life researching into Canadian cold war era Civil Defense sirens. Also to answer your question about the last siren in the video rotating from in the wind...Federal Sign and Signal 500SHTTs sometimes have issues for with the belts in their rotator mechanisms. Cheers from Canada. 🇨🇦
That particular rotating siren was known for having issues with the drive belt for the rotation mechanism which is why it moved in the wind. The belt likely deteriorated and crumbled apart allowing the siren to move freely. Kind of like putting a car into neutral.
the sirens phone and power lines are cut and the single directional sirens aka the "megaphone" sirens used rubber belts to rotate the sirens which now have disintegrated leaving those sirens able to be swiveled by wind or other causes. they would also rotate 360 degrees and not back in fourth in s small radius but all of the sirens are inactive and very rusted
A large majority of these sirens would still work, however many have not been tested in 30+ years. There is actually a very large group dedicated to sirens all across the country. It has been a life long hobby for many of us.
6:16 it could be the wind. They usually have belts on the rotator so it can’t spin freely. But since the siren was abandoned the belt could of rotted and plus, it was a windy night.
Not to mention those things had a piss poor design where to replace the belt you had to take the whole darn head apart which was a headache so often the belts were left to fall apart from rot or overtensioning resulting in either them failing to rotate upon activation or them to freely spin in the wind.
at 6:40 you ask if the siren was being tested that night? Was it just the wind? From your video I can comfortably say that the siren was being tested by ONLY the wind. That model siren rotates to broadcast its warning tones, its not geared to do a side to side motion like someone shaking their head to signal "no". Below the siren assembly itself, one can see the glass insulators for the power feed. There are no power cables connected to the siren's power feed, which I guess at one time came from the utility pole in the same photo. That power feed is completely barren, so the siren has no electrical power and electricity alone operates it. What you saw, in my opinion, was a result of the force of the ambient wind's positive pressure against the surface area of the siren's head, resulting in visible motion. The same physical principles can be observed with wind driving a three blade turbine to generate electricity. My wordy explanation can be replaced simply with "that's a disconnected siren being blown around in the wind".
i remember a couple of years ago my mom and i took a trip to downtown los angeles and on our way there we passed by two SD-10’s on accident, i still remember where they stood, one was directly on a sidewalk, and the other was in a public square, both of them are still standing.
Siren hunting really is a very rewarding activity. I've spent a few weekend days driving through small towns in MN to find unknown sirens not marked on the MN Siren locations map, and it's always just a fun rush to find another one, hiding right there in plain sight.
I'm from Fresno, CA. Even in Fresno they have some of these 50+ year old sirens still standing. It's true. I never noticed them until a couple years ago and wondered why they were there. All over California they were installed. A lot are still standing and I hope they stay standing to be honest.
Hey there. I'm also a fellow Fresnonite (if that's what you call them). I've noticed only one and it's on top of the old Veterans Memorial Museum in downtown. That one was the only one I've seen visually but from the siren maps there are multiple electric ones by Fresno Yosemite International Airport, but on maps there's one by the intersection of Walker Way and E Westover Ave. I'm not sure if you've seen that one. I moved to WV in 2016 but ever since i was a kid in the 2010s I always kept a keen eye on that certain siren as it stood out in my opinion. Just this comment in a way reopened the memory of that siren I always kept an eye on, as well as classified as a landmark. And yes I'm replying a year later, so I'm not sure if you'll see this.
I am the biggest fan of tornado sirens, Also one really old tornado siren been tested! I don’t know the name of the video, but I love tornados and tornado sirens
Here's the siren types LA had: The tiny birdhouse sirens are the Fedelcode Mach 3Ls. The birdhouse sirens with a small vent in the middle are Fedelcode Mach 7Ls, and Mach 7s. The birdhouse sirens with the wide vents in the middle are Federal Sign & Signal Model 5ATs. The wire spool sirens are Federal Sign & Signal Model SD-10s. The rotating sirens are Federal Sign & Signal Model 500A-SHTTs.
I've always loved History and I've been obsessed with air raid sirens since I was 12 and I've also seen some move and I'm not sure if it was doing it on it's own or what
Where I grew we had a siren that was used as a call for the volunteer fire deptment. www.twincities.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/thinkstockphotos-147014239-e1523551513800.jpg?w=1024&h=576
You would see these in the San Gabriel valley also. Anyway, when you heard the siren, you were supposed to tune your portable AM radio to 640 or 1240 Kcs (Khz) and take cover.
