Is today's test a CONELRAD ALERT?!?

[MineralMan]

I remember those, from the 50s and early 60s. "Duck and cover, kiddies...then kiss your asses goodbye!"

[slackmaster]

1. There was an air raid siren in my neighborhood when I was a kid

It got tested at noon on Wednesdays, until 1966 or so.

[MineralMan]

3. Same thing in my town, but they used the fire department's siren.

They even had a lookout post on top of the fire department, so Civil Defense plane spotters could do their jobs. Bizarre times.

[Brother Buzz]

17. Our fire department used horns

The blasts were coded, say three long, one short, to inform volunteer firemen where the fire was. I guess cellphones, radios, and pagers made the horn obsolete. We had a printed list to decode the signal. Today, the horn still signals noon and 5 pm everyday.

The Air Force maintained a radar base atop the mountain, connected to the Nike missile stations in the area so we could sleep soundly at night. I visited the radar base in 1960. All I remember is the Command Center having a big Plexiglas map, and the airmen stood behind it and wrote backward with China markers. Pretty heady stuff for a kid like me at the time.

[Brother Buzz]

13. Ours is still operational

It's tested once a month, still at high noon.

As a kid I never knew where is was located, just over the hill somewhere. Around 2000, around noon, I was playing golf and discovered it was a just a chip shot away from the old eight, the new fifth green, sitting atop a stout little pole. IT WAS LOUD! You can't putt with that sucker wailing.

[MineralMan]

16. In Saint Paul, MN, like most cities in Minnesota,

there's a whole network of sirens, used mainly for tornado warnings, but they can be used for any emergency. Very loud. There's one a block away from my house.

[MineralMan]

2. Duck and Cover!

[StarryNite]

5. Ahhhh

The olden days when we all had those nifty magical school desks that could protect us not only from the impact of bombs but also the radiation!

[MineralMan]

8. Yup. We were safe as could be under those desks.

If you could get to one of these, it was even better, though:

[hifiguy]

10. My dad built one of those in our basement

when I was a boy. Complete with bunks, sleeping bags and shelves of canned food. It was a great place to play astronaut when I was little. We used it during tornado warnings a couple of times.

[MineralMan]

11. Yeah, my father did, too, in 1960. Ours was under the house.

I was about 15, and I remember mixing the concrete for it. Very strange to think about now.

[StarryNite]

18. Yup, I had a friend that had one of those bomb shelters...

right in their front yard, underground of course. But the cool thing about those desks was that they were portable. You could carry them around on your back and be safe wherever you go!

[dixiegrrrrl]

23. Plus they had all that free gum on the bottom of them!!!!

Which kept the air raid drills from being boring, at least.
:evilgrin:

[onenote]

4. No.

Its the first ever test of the national emergency alert system.

[MineralMan]

6. Oh. OK. That's a relief....

:eyes:

[Kingofalldems]

7. Aren't the freepers claiming it's some kind of a plot?

[MineralMan]

9. I dunno. Probably.

[HereSince1628]

12. If it's not a NORAD drill, we don't need to worry about sky-scrappers

being knocked down during it, right? :crazy:

[MineralMan]

15. What? Me Worry?

[NeedleCast]

24. Yes. Beck Said It Was A Gov Attempt To Take Over Their Tee'Vees and Radio

And Beck said it, so it must be true.

[MineralMan]

31. Beck said it - It must be a paranoid delusion.

[grasswire]

14. I thought it was Friday n/t

[JohnnyRingo]

19. That's a cool retro graphic. Brings back memories.

Here in my small burg in NE Ohio we still test the fire siren every day at noon. We had an all volunteer fire dept until about ten years ago, and when the siren sounded firemen would rush to the fire station with their own sirens and flashing lights (they loved this, and I knew a couple who found this as the prime motivation to volunteer). I think there still are volunteer firemen in the city, but pagers and now cell phones, have made the siren a weather warning device only.

I believe our county tests the sirens every year about this time. I can hear sirens screaming from all directions for about five minutes. It can be a bit disturbing, and I still find myself hunkering under my computer desk until the "all clear" signal. LOL

[nadinbrzezinski]

20. Yes

The modern version. Remember to duck and cover.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

21. Mine was the generation of: "Bend over and place your head between your legs..."

"and kiss your ass goodbye."

I was born after all of that, but still during the back end of the cold war. We'd already realized by then if the shit hit the fan, we were toast. :D

[RebelOne]

29. Mine was the generation of duck under your school desks.

Yeah, like that was going to save you from a nuclear blast or radiation.

[jwirr]

22. When is the alert supposed to be happening today?

[dixiegrrrrl]

25. 3 pm. have no idea of time zone.

Have no tv or radio, so will not know about it.

[RebelOne]

26. 2 p.m. here on the east coast. It only lasted 30 seconds. n/t

[dixiegrrrrl]

28. Yeah, but did your computer explode and end civilization as we know it?

freepers said it would.

[JuniperLea]

27. I remember seeing those signs all over town...

The girls restroom at my elementary school was in the basement... and it had a CD sign posted by the doors! T'was a little creepy!

[MineralMan]

30. The church I attended had a basement - a rare thing in

California. It had a Fallout Shelter sign on an outside wall by the outside stairway down to the basement. There weren't too many signs in town, as I remember.