04/27/2026
With the forecast for the possibility of more severe weather on Monday, April 27th, and with the recent questions about the fire siren circulating on social media, we wanted to explain a few things.
For most calls for the fire department, whether it be a fire, accident, medical, or other type of call, the dispatch center may activate the fire siren. As it relates to our calls, it will only be activated between the hours of 6:00 AM and 11:00 PM. The cadence for this siren is five 7 second cycles with 5 seconds in between.
Our personnel operate as what is referred to as Paid On Call volunteer, which means that we all have other jobs and the fire station is not staffed 24/7. When a call comes in, we are notified and respond to the station in our personal vehicles if we are available. The Ambulance service is staffed 24/7 with at least 2 people, one of which is a paramedic.
Although we do issue pagers to our personnel, and do have an app on our phones, occasionally our members may be outside of their homes without their pager or phone. Just like you sometimes forget your phone at home. There have also been occurrences where the pagers did not activate and/or the app was not working. The pagers are tested every night at 5:00 PM, and a radio response is required by one of the fire officers to confirm the page was received. If any issues are noted with this daily test, then the appropriate people are notified for repairs to be made. The fire siren is to be tested at 5:00 PM every Monday.
Because of the possibility of either radio or phone app failure, as well as our members just being away from their devices, we have elected to continue the use of the fire siren as an additional alerting mechanism between the hours that were listed above.
Aside from alerting the firefighters, we see a benefit in alerting the public that there is a fire call. First, as mentioned above, the members respond to the fire station on Lincoln Street in their personal vehicles. Most of us have flashing blue lights in our vehicles that we activate while we are responding. These lights are referred to as ‘courtesy lights’, that request that other motorists yield to these vehicles. By having the fire siren activated, we hope that the motorists traveling on Main Street or in the vicinity of the fire station will have heightened awareness of these approaching vehicles and pull over to the right when they encounter them, so we may safely continue on our route to the fire station.
The second benefit in alerting the public of a fire call, is that after we all arrive at the fire station, there will be one or more emergency vehicles responding to the scene of the emergency, so the fire siren hopefully will again cause heightened awareness by the other motorists of the approaching emergency vehicles.
Now, on to the use of the fire siren as the Tornado warning. The Police Department is responsible for alerting the public of an impeding weather emergency. The Fire Department has agreed to let them use the fire siren as ONE of the ways to notify the public. When this happens, the cadence is different from that which is used for a fire call. The weather emergency consists of three 1-minute blasts, 30 seconds apart. There is NOT a time of day restriction on the Tornado siren activation. There is NOT an all-clear signal. If, after the first round of three, it sounds again, that means there is still a threat and you should continue to take the proper precautions.
As stated above, the fire siren’s use as a weather warning is only ONE method the Police Department uses to warn residents. The other ways they recommend to receive warnings are to register for their NIXLE alerts, and also to possess a working weather radio that receives alerts from the National Weather Service. Your cell phone should also issue an alert if a tornado warning is issued in your area. The weather radio and cell phone alerts are NOT controlled by the Marseilles Police Department.
Another point to be aware of is that the fire siren, whether it is being used to alert of a fire call, or if it is being used or alert of a weather emergency, is known as an outdoor siren. Which means that it is meant to be heard by those persons that are outdoors at the time of activation. You may or may not hear it in your home, depending on your distance from the siren, how well your home is insulated, and weather conditions. Rain, wind, snow, and even relative humidity all play a role in how effectively sound travels.
These two uses of our fire siren are different from the siren you may hear tested at 10:00 AM on the first Tuesday of every month. Those sirens are to be used solely to alert to an incident at the nuclear power station located south of Marseilles, where action is required to be taken by the public. They are not available to the local governments to warn of a weather emergency.
Hopefully, this explains a bit about our operation and the need for the fire siren, as well as explain the difference between the fire call siren and the weather emergency siren.
Please stay safe.
