By Frost McGahey
In an earlier article on siren noise a pickleball player at the Rec Center said, "I was across the street from the hospital and saw three emergency vehicles leave with sirens and lights on full blast. And I thought why not just have the first driver do it? The noise was deafening."
The reason for so many vehicles is that a medical emergency call is dispatched to BOTH the Gila Regional Ambulance service PLUS the Silver City Fire Department. So BOTH respond to a call and since they are very close to each other the noise can be deafening.
As a resident who lives close to the GRMC ambulance barn said, "The EMTs here hit their sirens before they even leave their ambulance bay. If only they would first turn on their lights and hit their horns and then once on 32nd Street, use their sirens if needed."
He added, "The hospital is located immediately east of the EMT building, Silver High School is just west of it, and two nursing homes are just north of the building on Fowler Avenue. That's a lot of noise for those people."
That immediate blasting of sirens is unnecessary. As a retired firefighter said, " When I left the Station, I was always told to never blast the siren until I was on the street and over a 100 feet from the station, and not blare directly into the homes across the street.
We were also told not to use sirens in residential areas or next to hospitals or schools in session unless there is excessive traffic. As long as they follow the rules of the road and don't use excessive speed, they should be covered using lights only when "no one" is in front of them on residential streets!
Just a protocol change would be a WONDERFUL start to addressing the problem of too much siren noise!"
Sirens at night are especially disruptive. A retired paramedic said, "In Orange County, we had a tiered response system. Some calls didn't need lights or sirens. Because I'm sensitive to the noise of sirens, at night I'm woken 7 out of 10 times by a siren. Why? There's no traffic."
Some municipalities have limited the use of sirens at night. One woman who spent the night in Tucson at a hotel next to a major medical center said, "We heard sirens up until about 10 and then never heard another one all night!!! So if Tucson can do it, so can we!"
Silver City's Ambulance Sirens: The Negative Effects (grantcountybeat.com)
