Tornado Sirens

Tornado sirens, which were first conceived as air-raid sirens in the 1950s, have become an essential part of weather safety, especially in the mid-southern United States. Their loud, fluctuating sound alerts people to the threat of a tornado. For testing, the sirens run for five minutes at a specific time each week (generally noon on Wednesdays in Arkansas) as long there is not threatening weather. What started out as a byproduct of war-fear has turned into a life-saving device during severe weather, and the advance warning given by the sirens has dramatically reduced the number of deaths and severe injury due to tornadoes across the country.

The first air-raid siren was tested in Wichita, Kansas, on April 22, 1952, intended to alert communities of impending air raids or nuclear attacks, a growing fear as tensions mounted during the Cold War era. The siren was expected to produce sounds that could be heard throughout a 1.25-mile radius. To test this, Civil Defense volunteers were given decibel readers and spread out in five different points away from the siren. The siren was sounded while pointing at each of the five points and then allowed to rotate in a full circle while sounding. In this testing, people in some parts of town could hear the siren well, others could not hear the siren, and some reported that they could not distinguish it from a police siren. The sirens were improved and then installed across the city.

After a deadly tornado in Wichita in 1957, Civil Defense had begun drafting plans to use the air raid sirens as severe weather alerts. On June 11, 1958, the Wichita weather service issued a warning on the wire to law enforcement alerting them to incoming severe weather. The officer who received the alert decided to switch on the sirens after repeated attempts to contact superiors had failed. Later accounts from citizens of Wichita stated that the sirens were their first warning of dangerous weather, with some recalling that they reacted to the sirens minutes before their homes were destroyed.

By the 1970s, tornado sirens could be found in medium to large cities across the South. The Courier News of Blytheville (Mississippi County) reported on April 25, 1975, that the city would be pursuing federal funds to aid in the installation of five sirens strategically placed around the community. In 1977, Camden (Ouachita County) installed five sirens around the city. Dumas (Desha County) first installed sirens in 1980, with members of the Dumas Civil Defense installing the first two of three planned sirens in mid-July. There is no generalized law or regulation that determines how many tornado alert sirens are needed for a certain population size; rather, it is based on if a siren can be heard. Local governments are responsible for determining when to sound the alerts in cases of severe weather.

While people often receive weather alerts on cellphones in the twenty-first century, traditional sirens are still important, although there are many misconceptions about them. According to the Department of Emergency Management in Vilonia (Faulkner County), sirens are designed to alert people who are outside, so those inside might not hear them. Sirens are also not precise as to location or time of threat, with many being used countywide and only sounding for about three minutes at a time. People should amass numerous layers of protection against severe weather, including National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather radios, weather alert apps for smart phones, and a television tuned to the nearest news station.

For additional information:
Coleman, Timothy A., Kevin R. Knupp, James Spann, J.B. Elliott, and Brian E. Peters. “The History (and Future) of Tornado Warning Dissemination in the United States.” American Meteorological Society, May 1, 2011. Online at https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/92/5/2010bams3062_1.xml#:~:text=Outdoor%20warning%20sirens%2C%20originally%20designed,greatly%20reduce%20the%20warning%20area (accessed February 26, 2026).

Mele, Christopher. “Tornado Sirens, an Old Technology, Still Play a Vital Role.” New York Times, May 23, 2016. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/us/tornado-sirens-an-old-technology-still-play-a-vital-role.html (accessed February 26, 2026).

“Outdoor Warning Siren History.” Sedgwick County, Kansas. https://www.sedgwickcounty.org/emergency-management/history/outdoor-warning-siren-history/ (accessed February 26, 2026).

“The Purpose Of Outdoor Warning Sirens” City of Vilonia, Arkansas, November 25, 2015. https://www.cityofvilonia.net/post/2015/11/25/the-purpose-of-outdoor-warning-sirens (accessed February 26, 2026)

“Tornado Preparedness.” Faulkner County Government. https://www.faulknercountyar.gov/oem/preparedness/tornado/ (accessed February 26, 2026).

“Weather Siren Testing to Begin.” Camden News, October 1, 1977, p. 1.

Mikaela Bailey
University of Arkansas at Little Rock