Alarm Systems

Federal officials are expected to announce today that they will install a $6-million warning system at LAX that dramatically reduced close calls on the ground in tests at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. At a news conference this afternoon, Robert A. Sturgell, acting FAA administrator, is expected to detail the agency's plan to install lights on one of the airport's four runways and at various taxiways on the north and south airfields. Testing is to begin early next year.

On a recent morning while Glenn Geraghty was away, the security alarm at his Watts home went off. When Los Angeles police officers arrived, a neighbor with a key to the house offered a sheepish apology: Geraghty's dog, Checkers, had pawed open the gate on his cage and tripped the alarm's motion sensors. The police left, only to be summoned back hours later when the dog got free a second time. That should have been the end of it. A city law grants only two false alarms every 12 months.

Broken fire alarms at nearly a dozen buildings at Santa Ana College went unrepaired for more than two years because of miscommunication and a can't-someone-else-do-it mentality, and because officials did not declare an emergency to fix the antiquated system, an investigation by a law firm found. "Everybody thought it was someone else's responsibility," said Eddie Hernandez, chancellor of the Rancho Santiago Community College District.

A proposal to double the permit fee for burglar alarms in Los Angeles drew objections Tuesday from police commissioners, who worried that it might further discourage people from paying the cost. About 38% of residents and businesses with alarms lack permits but that is down sharply from past years, officials said. The Police Commission staff proposed raising the annual permit fee from $31 to $63 to recover the cost of processing permits.

With the frightening wail of air-raid sirens, routine duck-and-cover drills and fallout shelters, the government prepared Americans for Japanese bombs during World War II and nuclear attacks during the Cold War. In the wake of the recent killing rampage at Virginia Tech, governments and institutions are debating how to warn people of emergencies today.

Seven buildings at Santa Ana College, including the administration offices and the library, have faulty fire alarms, placing thousands of students, faculty and staff in potential danger. The alarms have been broken since at least June 2005, according to reports given to the school at that time by a contractor the college hired. Some have broken handles, others do not ring, and at least one was turned off because it would not stop sounding.

Nearly four dozen sirens have arrived in Humboldt County as part of a warning system for earthquake-generated waves along the north coast. Some of the 47 sirens will be placed along tsunami-prone areas and tied into a system that emergency officials are just beginning to create.

Federal and local officials will unveil a new warning system today that is designed to stop runway incursions that for years have endangered planes taxiing to and from terminals at Los Angeles International Airport. The $7-million system relies on radar that is connected to status lights along a runway and eight taxiways deemed to have the highest risk for aircraft accidents.

Alarm companies must now ensure that all city residents and businesses that purchase new alarm systems also possess a valid city permit before installation, according to an ordinance approved Friday by the City Council. Officials say the measure will improve the city's rate of reimbursement for responding to false alarms, more than 100 of which occur a day. Under the new rules, alarm companies must collect the $31 permit fee themselves if customers have not already paid the city.