Emergency sirens
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0Emergency sirens
Emergency Sirens is a soundscape with passing emergency vehicles: ambulance, fire, police. The recording features the characteristic finely modulated European-type siren (a two-tone bee-baw alternating at around 600 to 1000 Hz) and the less ordered American-type with rapid wee-yoo sweeps. Sirens pass with the Doppler effect (approach, peak, recede) while city noise sits in the background.
Sirens are legally loud stress, deliberately designed as a sound that cannot be ignored. The International Telecommunication Union in its E-Mode standard (2005) prescribes that peak frequency must fall in the 800 to 1600 Hz band (the same peak-sensitivity zone of the human ear) and that modulation between two tones must occur at least four times per second. That is why a siren is audible through glass and headphones. Psychologically the priority-attention mode kicks in: Tannen and colleagues (Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 2018) showed that even at the threshold of hearing, a siren pulls attention away from any task.
Use this track as a sound effect for writing urban noir and crisis prose, for podcasts about emergency services and hospitals, for sound design, or for contrast therapy (sharp sirens into silence equals amplified relaxation). Pairs with City Noise, Traffic Jam and Bombardment (for heavier themes). Categorically not for sleep or work; a traumatising sound for people with PTSD.
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ReduxSound v1.0.0
Ambient sound mixer for relaxation and focus