Audible alert/siren system tested in Atherton

Posted by Peter Carpenter
a resident of Atherton: Lindenwood
on Apr 19, 2018 at 11:01 am
Peter Carpenter is a registered user.

SOUND OFF
The Menlo Park Fire District conducts a side by side testing of a new mass evacuation system that actually
uses voice capability - versus an older siren tone

The Menlo Park Fire District Board of Directors recently adopted five primary goals for 2018, one of which was “to develop and implement a District-wide audio alert system.

Wednesday afternoon, April 18, 2018, the entire five member Fire Board, Fire Chief, Atherton’s Police Chief, Walsh Road resident Stephen Nachtsheim and a few others guests got their first look at what a new system could look and sound like up at the Bear Gulch Reservoir in Atherton, where Cal-Water, the Town of Atherton and the Fire District partnered almost a decade ago to install an evacuation siren system in case of a potential dam failure or wildland fire.

The Fire Districts Emergency Manager, Ryan Zollicoffer arranged for a very helpful side by side comparison and test between the older existing Whalin Siren System and the proposed new vendor LRAD (Long Range Acoustic Devices) who arrived with their mobile trailer 360XT unit. The company is based in San Diego.

‘We’ve been looking at ways to upgrade and improve our existing system for several years now. We started looking at the LRAD platforms and the enhanced versatility of fixed and mobile 360 degree systems that they provide which allow either pre-scripted, multi-language, voice emergency messaging or instant real time messaging and information to occur after an attention tone” Zollicoffer said.

The side by side “sound off” started with the Whalin Siren operating in the dam failure mode emitting over a 110 decibel continuous, obnoxious tone for over a minute, designed to get people’s attention.

LRAD’s representatives, Ernest and Mike, explained that most local residents probably couldn’t remember which siren tone meant what and newer residents, guests and visitors more than likely wouldn’t understand their meaning at all.

Dubbed the Walsh Road Evacuation Siren, the system was always limited by older existing technology when it was first installed in August of 2009. The need for a fixed site, pole, electrical power, phone line that used a small shared budget due to the recession, further limited the options of where it could realistically be located because cost and connectivity were an issue.

Fire Chief Harold Schapelhouman said “at the time, it could only locally be compared to the abandoned World War II evacuation signaling siren system the Fire District still tested monthly when I started here in 1981”. That system was abandoned by the County in the 1990’s as the cold war faded and the Soviet Union broke apart. So something was better than nothing but from the start we were always looking for “better” and could never find it, until now.

The LRAD 360 XT trailer mounted mobile self-contained unit with a 30 foot telescoping mast working off of a rechargeable battery pack with remote activation capability via the internet and cellular network can use either a pre-scripted messages from an MP3 player in a variety of languages, or real time communications that can broadcast and delivered as an exceptional, highly intelligible (understandable) voice message needed for mass notification or other purposes.

“The side by side test was very helpful and everyone agreed that the LRAD System completely outperformed the older siren system. Not only because of the voice capability but the modular mobility benefit is something that appeals to first responders because it can be used for a variety of public safety purposes and better moved around if that’s needed or desired” Zollicoffer said.

The Fire District Board and the Town of Atherton Council members discussed improving the existing system and its potential expansion at their joint meeting held in December of 2017. Fire Board President Carpenter then referenced the North Bay Fire’s and the need for a combination of mandatory cellular phone emergency messaging along with a secondary and a more basic system like the Walsh Road Evacuation Siren, only better, because people don’t always have their phones with them, especially at night time and most have abandoned land based phone line service all together.

“I think we just saw what better looks like and I’m going to ask the Fire Board to fund the modular and trailered unit in this next fiscal year’s budget so we can fully exercise its capabilities by not only using it at various events but also by conducting District wide testing in all of our jurisdictions, Atherton, East Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Unincorporated County Areas and some of our larger facilities and campuses like SLAC, Facebook, the VA Hospital, SRI, USGS and our 30 some odd school campuses as well”, Fire Chief Schapelhouman said.

The testing will also allow the Fire District to better determine:
• The best locations for a unit
• Can that site be used as a mobile location or as a fixed site and will mounting work?
• What other Governmental and private sector partners or donors would be interested in helping work with and financially support this project?
• Should potential threats or risks be prioritized?
• If so, using what criteria?
Chief Schapelhouman also sees a role for this improved technology for local Firefighters and the 28 National Urban Search and Rescue (US&R) Teams sponsored by FEMA/DHS, of which the Fire District is one of those sponsoring agencies.

“Many fire agencies still use the air horns on their fire apparatus to signal that their people inside of a burning or collapsing building need to immediately evacuate. While that works, it can be problematic and a confusing technique! In the National arena, at places like the Oklahoma City Bombing, the evacuation system for us rescuers in and around the collapsed structure consisted of an apparatus air horn connected to a breathing air cylinder, both located in a wheel barrow. It worked to a point but it didn’t improve much at the World Trade Center Collapse, they tried to use a public address system located on top of a high rise building but you could never understand what they were saying and it sounded something like blah, blah, blah, so at first we would all look up, but eventually no one paid attention to it anymore and they stopped using it. So we resorted back to localized, handheld air horns and that’s still primarily what we would use today”, the Chief said.

These new mass evacuation notification platforms, which were first developed for the military, seem to be a very good solution to many of the current and potentially problematic, mass communication and evacuation challenges faced by first responders... The trailered LRAD system costs around $125k, while fixed systems can be much less expensive depending on supporting infrastructure and intended use. The hand held and vehicle mounted systems cost about $6k each, depending upon their desired features.