Massachusetts Fire Department’s Eerie Air Raid Siren Sounds Daily

If you've ever been within a quarter-mile of the Westminster Fire Department around lunchtime, chances are you've heard a loud, piercing siren that suddenly fills the air for about 10 seconds before falling silent. The first time you hear it, it's enough to make you stop what you're doing and wonder if something serious is happening.

That's exactly what happened to a good friend of mine who was working construction across the street from the fire station. Around noon, the alarm suddenly blared, leaving everyone on the job site thinking the worst. When it sounded again at the exact same time the following day, curiosity got the best of them.

So, of course I had to get down to the bottom of this mystery.

A Daily Test With Decades of History

Westminster Fire Chief Kyle Butterfield explained that the siren is actually a legacy mass notification device: an air raid siren that's tested every day at noon. The test lasts only about 10 seconds, but it serves an important purpose.

According to Butterfield, conducting the daily test helps the department earn credit toward its ISO fire insurance rating, a classification used to evaluate a community's fire protection capabilities.

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The tradition has also stood the test of time. Butterfield said the noon siren has been sounding every single day since at least 1981, when he was born, and the siren itself dates back to the original fire station built in the 1950s.

More Than Just a Loud Noise

Long before smartphones, text alerts and pagers, the siren played a vital role in the community. "It used to be how they notified the call fire department and the community during major emergencies," Butterfield said. Today, most longtime residents hardly notice it anymore, similar to church bells. So the next time you hear Westminster's noon siren, you can rest easy. It's not an emergency, it's a daily tradition.