This Colorado town installed flood sirens almost a decade ago. They went unused until now.
Heads up residents of Georgetown, your quiet mountain town is about to get a little nosier every first Wednesday of each month.
The early warning dam sirens that have been in place for years and are just now being activated will be starting at 10 a.m. on March 6. According to Clear Creek County, each test will sound like the following:
- "Attention! This is a test of the dam failure warning system. This is only a test. If this was an actual emergency you would receive instructions. This is only a test."
- Whoop tone for 30 seconds.
- Post-test message: "This has been a test of the dam failure warning system. This was only a test."
The siren locations are as follows:
- Xcel Energy Georgetown Substation, 600 Griffith Street
- Werlin Park, 11th Street and Taos Street
- Meadows Park tennis/basketball courts, Main Street (south of Skyline Drive)
- Georgetown Lake west shore, Tom Bennhoff Lake Trail (north of the restrooms)
Lynette Kelsey, police judge of Georgetown, explained she's not quite sure what the hold up was for years after the sirens were installed, but what matters now is that they're about to get monthly use and residents will need to be aware of what's happening to make the best use of them.
The sirens would actually sound in an emergency should the dams above town give way and send a cascading wall of water down the valley into town, which would give people minutes to evacuate.
"There aren't that many ways to get out of town," Kelsey said, gesturing east. "What are you going to do, outrun it going that way?"
While Kelsey said she's no stranger to the idea of sirens going off, having grown up in the Midwest, she said it will take some getting used to in Georgetown. But eventually, it will feel like home again.
"If it goes off the same time every month, you hear it and you go, "what's that?" and then you register," Kelsey said. But she doesn't want people to grow complacent. "You need to be ready to leap into action (if it's the real deal) because we don't have that much time."