Air Raid Sirens today - why?

Right about noon today we heard air raid sirens (or something similar) in Wiesbaden. It lasted for maybe 30 seconds. We've been here over 7 months and haven't heard it before. Does anyone know if this was a scheduled test? Is this something new or do they only test it this frequently?

We had it in Cologne too and I'm sure I've heard it before

I always check thelocal and BBC for declarations of war etc

Edit: Search to the rescue, http://www.toytowngermany.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=35863 & http://www.toytowngermany.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=50652

Cologne, Wiesbaden - there must be an alarm at the Westfront. Seems the war department does not trust the new Nobel Peace Prize winner that much

On a more serious note, in the countryside this is a common event, in bigger cities not so much. You may find further information in your local newpaper, just look for Sirenenprobe or Probealarm. And don't worry as long as you hear it at the full hour; calamity tends to strike a few minutes after.

Christ, you'd be lucky! The best you could hope for is that The Local reads a post from another TTer and then badly rewrites it with an accompanying picture of an unrelated war. Perhaps Crimea.

NEWSFLASH from the LOCAL!!! Civil unrest has errupted in Crimea....

I grew up in a small rural town in the US. While some farmers claimed that the daily noontime test was a handy call to lunch that one could hear over the roar of the farm equipment (especially since most farmers kept their wristwatches nice for Sunday ... just like a neighbor kid who lost his arm in a corn auger had a hook for work and a latex "Sunday hand" that screwed on complete with bike derailleur cable actuators), the real reason was a holdover from WWII air raid siren tests.

I'm not sure if Germany ever had those as well. I attended an event yesterday where someone was moaning about how the churchbells bothered him, so I'd doubt it.

During the duck and cover era, we were all taught that if the siren went off and just kept wailing and wailing, it was the Big One. Therefore, whenever the siren began to wind down again, I always was flood with a sense of relief that non-noontime sirens were "only" a fire or ambulance call.

Here in the South they use the air raid sirens in some small towns/villages when there is a fire. We are guessing that it is because the houses are so close together it is a good warning for all.

When I first moved to Frankfurt in 1986, the siren used to go off on Fridays at 12. I lived in Griesheim, close to Nied. Don't remember when it stopped though.

Are you sure it was an air raid siren and not an ordinary fire siren?
I think these sirens are used to call the voluntary fire brigade to the station, although you hear it more often in smaller towns and villages where there is no professional fire brigade.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirenensignal

Scrool down a bit there you see the different types of sirens.

Probably at some point between 1990 and 1993. The civil protection stuff was winding down majorly then. Pretty much the only major civil protection infrastructure still fully active from Cold War times is the vast NBC sensor network for occasions like April '86 (something like 20,000 sensor stations spread around Germany, one every 20 km plus double rings around each nuclear plant).

Happens in our small city all the time, at least 1-2 times a month. I am not so much scared of a bombing, it just reminds me of silent hill, which creeps me out.

We had our in Darmstadt on Wednesday (I think it was Weds, the days blur into one!). I was really fed up as I'd just got the baby to sleep for her nap and they bloody woke her up!

Hi,

I think the following link will explain. I hope you can read German - if not they are just testing the alarm systems. Four times per year. Every second Tuesday in January and July plus every first Saturday in April and October.

Sirenenüberprüfung
Zur Überprüfung der Funktionsfähigkeit aller Sirenen erfolgt viermal im Jahr ein Probelauf, der sich wie folgt gliedert:
Jeden zweiten Dienstag im Januar und jeden zweiten Dienstag im Juli um 19:00 Uhr laufen die Sirenen für nur etwa 5 Sekunden kurz an. Das Ansprechen aller Sirenen im Stadtgebiet auf das auslösende Funksignal der Leitstelle sowie das Anlaufen der Sirenen selbst wird hier von den Mitgliedern der Freiwilligen Feuerwehren der Landeshauptstadt Wiesbaden sowie den Werk- u. Betriebsfeuerwehren überprüft, die an jedem Sirenenstandort ein Feuerwehrmitglied postieren und das Ergebnis der Überprüfung dem Sachgebiet Katastrophenschutz der Berufsfeuerwehr Wiesbaden mitteilen.
Jeden ersten Samstag im April und jeden ersten Samstag im Oktober gegen 12:00 Uhr erfolgt ein Ablauf des Sirenensignals "Warnung der Bevölkerung vor besonderen Gefahren" in voller Länge (Heulton von einer Minute Dauer).
Damit werden ebenfalls alle Sirenen auf Funktionsfähigkeit überprüft sowie den BürgerInnen und Bürgern der Landeshauptstadt Wiesbaden die Möglichkeit gegeben, sich mit dem für sie äußerst wichtigen Signal vertraut zu machen.

http://www.feuerwehr-wiesbaden.de/File/Start.php3?page=Warndienst.dat