Front end, or roof mounted??

[Ops Paramedic]

Lets not be paramedics for this one and try to resuscitate old threads on this one!! (This thread refers to branded emergency vehicles only, NOT to POVs)

Any of you complaining about difficuilty in hearing, in general, at home, amungst friends?? What i am getting at is the "Siren". I don't know the way in which your rigs are convertred, hence me asking. We have only recently started to mount the siren in the front grill or front bumper of of some of the our response cars (Your fly cars), and it is auctually very comforting on the ears.Where do you mount yours?

This would lead me to the next question: How effective is it then compaired to the roof mounted version? The technician who installed it even installed it facing downwards, to the road, and said that it is more effective and that the sound is reflected in some way. I know it works when it is roof mounted, and appears to be working when bumper mounted. With the the siren now mounted in front of the crew, we have placed a 200watt coil, instead of the old 100watt coil on the roof, and still it is less anoying than on the roof...

The last question is regarding the use of sirens. When do you use them? Some services require that you engage the siren on every response (making your way to any emergency call), no matter the time of day, or location you are driving in. Do you engage the siren down a dark and decelated road 0200am in the morning with no intersections, or only at intersections, or none at all??

 

[Jon]

My FD used to have a roof-mounted siren on our brush truck, and the truck became a quieter ride when the siren was moved to the bumper.

All of our sirens are foward-facing, and mounted either in/behind the grille, or under the front bumper. Almost all of the ambulances have 2 100W speakers. Some have a single, middle mounted 200W, and some will have an extra 100W speaker for a secondary siren.

Around here, most services respond to ALL 911 calls with lights and sirens. My volunteer squad has a few exceptions to this: Fire Standby/CO alarm where there is no reported patients, medical alert alarm, "public assist" (fallen and can't get up, but isn't injured) and EDP's, becuase we've got to wait for PD anyway.

Using the siren is a balancing act. When I'm going to the call, I'll use the siren constantly in traffic or on busy roads, but when I get onto side streets, I try to kill the siren, or use it sparingly. In the late night or early morning, I'll also try to keep the siren use to a minimum, if possible. I've worked with partners who have the motto of "If I'm up... EVERYONE is up." but I see no need to incur that bad karma for myself and my EMS agency.

Now I also acknowledge that if I don't use the siren, and something happens... it will almost certainly be my fault... so I'm careful to use the siren when exercising my emergency vehicle privileges.

Around here, we have Opticoms... when my emergency lights are on, my opticom is on. This means that I almost never need to cross a red traffic light... which reduces some of my risk.


When I transport patients emergently, I try to use the siren as sparingly as possible... I my perspective, an emergent ride to the ED needs to be SMOOTH more than fast... and if I keep the noise down, my partners can talk with the patient. I'll use sirens when I need to... but often a simple tap on the electronic siren's "manual" or "airhorn" button clears traffic out of my way.

 

[daemonicusxx]

I'm with Jon on this one. during daytime hours, The siren is on during the entire response. early morning when it is still dark, the siren is on while im traveling main roads and highways, but i try to turn it off when in neighborhoods. if im traveling lights/no siren, i'll usually drive slower and not take as many liberties (since ill be the one answering to the Incident Review Board on why i didnt have the siren on), usually using the manual or air horn at intersections. the way my agency has their sirens set up is two 100w speakers mounted under the headlights. the siren setting i use most is a dual setting, wail on one and yelp on the other, i find that when using both siren patterns, people her it earlier, and have longer to move over. at intersections, when i use the air horn, it only uses one speaker, so i can be "honking" the horn, and still have the wail going. i find that people dont respond to the air horn as well as they do to the siren. so this ends up being a little safer.