#siren testing

[caustickally]

Ope, it's the first Wednesday of the month.

[xenthecreative]

They're testing the sirens. I guess last night's Apocalyptic testing wasn't enough 😂

[dreadful-as-usual]

The monthly siren testing is just a grim reminder to be very afraid if it wails on any other day than Wednesday.

[light-of-eyllwe]

Gotta love those eerie 10am sirens on the first Tuesday of every month. Geezus. What is this, silent hill?

[headofocs-inklesspen]

Story time

Alright, so I live in Kansas maybe... an hour or so from the Missouri boarder, right smack in tornado alley. And so, because we get huge and freaking terrifying wind-vortexes-of-death-and-destruction it’s mandated every town has some many tornado sirens per so many houses and they have to be regularly tested. Luckily, never have I heard them tested on a day that was storming; that would scare the shit outta me, but that’s not the story. Anyway, my town and the town over both test the sirens typically on the first Wednesday of every month and usually from April, when tornado season begins to around August or September (little longer than tornado season but just to make sure they work) and every now and again they may test them once or twice in autumn/winter to make sure they still work. Well, my school isn’t close enough to hear the one for the neighborhoods around it, we have a system that I assume goes off if the others are heard by faculty. So, the past two-three times the sirens were tested, I never heard them - it’s Wednesday, it’s eleven in the morning, typically I’d be in Forensics talking with my table mates. Now it’s summer and my house is relatively close to one of the sirens in my tiny town and also close enough that we can also hear the siren for the farms to the west of us (I think west). Welcome to today; June 1st both the first of the month and the first Wednesday of the month. So there I am walking my dog, sun shining, handful of clouds in the distance, it’s actually kinda nice.

Cue sirens.

I jump, look around, see no-one else outside except two kids running for the door. Now, I;m halfway down the street from  where I live and thinking “shit, what’s going on? Is there a funnel in a nearby town? Because if there’s a tornado, even as far as Olathe, we still here sirens. So I go, run passed two houses with my dog, am considering running across the yards to get home faster then realize, It’s the first Wednesday of June. I am an idiot.

So yeah, Tumblr, I’m an idiot. I would think I’d know when the sirens were legit vs. when they’re being tested by now. Apparently I don’t.