Jarring alarms out, quieter alerts in. New firehouse dispatch systems aim to ease stress

DANBURY, Conn. (AP) — Until recently, a call coming into the Danbury Fire Department meant alarms and tones immediately blasting at high volume — startling the firefighters before they headed out to scenes that could get their hearts pumping even faster.

Capt. Kevin Lunnie said the effect could be “overwhelming.” He noticed a big jump in his heart rate when the alerts went off, which isn’t a good thing in a profession where heart problems are the leading cause of on-duty deaths.

But the city is now taking a gentler approach. A new system that went online in September includes alarms that start softer before gradually increasing in volume, while a computerized voice calmly announces the information the firefighters need to know about the incoming emergency.

“It’s much easier on your nervous system,” Lunnie said.

Danbury, a city of around 87,000 people in southwestern Connecticut, is using the new alerts in its five fire stations, joining thousands of other departments around the U.S. and world aiming to both reduce stress and improve response times.

On a recent weekday, a call came into Danbury’s main fire station and the alert began with a single, soft tone. “Truck 1,” said the automated female voice. “Respond to sick person,” it said, giving the patient's address.

Around the firehouse, warm, red lighting flashed while monitors displayed the nature and location of the emergency. A timer display began to count down from two minutes, with the goal of firefighters leaving the station before the time ran out.

It’s both calmer and clearer than the old system, which began with full-volume single tones followed by cacophony of longer ones that fluctuated between high and low pitches. Dispatchers would previously announce the calls over the station speaker system, which firefighters said could be static-y and hard to understand.

“Most people found it very jarring,” Lunnie said of the system, which would jolt firefighters awake day or night.

The new setup is integrated into the computer-aided dispatching system. So when a dispatcher takes an emergency call and logs the initial information, it can alert the stations and units faster than department staff, while also sending the call information to firefighters’ phones and watches.

The result, according to Danbury Assistant Fire Chief William Lounsbury, is quicker response times.

Danbury tapped around $500,000 in funding from the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act to pay for the new Phoenix G2 system, made by Honeywell subsidiary US Digital Designs. That same system is in nearly 6,000 firehouses around the U.S., according to Honeywell.

Other companies make similar alerting systems that are in many stations nationwide.

Advocates of the gentler approach point to a decade-old study that found alert systems using an immediately loud sound increased firefighter heart rates by a median of seven beats a minute, compared with five beats a minute under a system that phased in the volume.

Although the difference was relatively small, researchers said it was statistically significant.

“When the alarm was used in a ramp-up fashion — so a gradual buildup on the alarm — the heart rate was lower to the alarm, so it put less stress on their body,” said Dr. Jay MacNeal, associate emergency medical services director for the Beloit Fire Department in Wisconsin and one of the study’s authors.

More than 40 Beloit firefighters took part in the study, which was published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene in 2016 by researchers at the Emergency Medicine Department at Mercyhealth in Janesville, Wisconsin, and Yale University in Connecticut.

According to the National Fire Protection Association, of the 51 on-duty firefighter deaths in the U.S. in 2024, 20 were caused by sudden cardiac death, the leading cause of the fatalities.

Last year, the NFPA issued new standards for fire station alerts that include using alarms and tones that start at lower volumes, as well as calm, computerized voices, citing the need to reduce stress.

The International Association of Fire Fighters, a union representing more than 360,000 firefighters and paramedics in the U.S. and Canada, also supports progressive-volume alerting systems. But it is seeking specific standards on how they are designed.

Research on the best way to alert firefighters to emergency calls is lacking, and each system now on the market is different, said Sean DeCrane, the IAFF's assistant to the general president for health and safety.

“We would like to see an industry standard that really starts to define the decibel levels, the intervals, the integration of turning on the lights, what that progression should be, and we believe the standard should be based on research,” DeCrane said.

A Danbury Fire Department truck leaves the station, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2026, in Danbury, Conn. (AP Photo/Dave Collins)

Danbury Assistant Fire Chief William Lounsbury poses for a photo, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2026, at the Danbury Fire Department, in Danbury, Conn. (AP Photo/Dave Collins)

A component of Danbury’s new Phoenix G2 alerting system flashes a red light during an alarm Sunday, Jan. 22, 2026, at the Danbury Fire Department, in Danbury, Conn. (AP Photo/Dave Collins)

A firefighter shows how the Danbury Fire Department’s new Phoenix G2 alerting system sends information to firefighters’ phones, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2026, at the station, in Danbury, Conn. (AP Photo/Dave Collins)

The Danbury Fire Department's new Phoenix G2 alerting system receives a call, Jan. 22, 2026, at the station in Danbury, Conn. (AP Photo/Dave Collins)

CAIRO (AP) — Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen overnight claimed new attacks on neighboring Saudi Arabia, as Yemen's Saudi-backed government described the rebels' swift advance along the Red Sea coast as a “painful” development in a new front in the Iran war.

The Houthis' capture of a key port city and an island on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a crucial shipping alternative to the Strait of Hormuz, in recent days has alarmed markets and Yemeni civilians who fear a return to devastating civil war.

Overnight, the Houthis claimed more attacks with missiles and drones on Saudi Arabia, which supports Yemen's internationally recognized government that's been fighting the rebels.

A Houthi military spokesperson, Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, claimed in a statement that they targeted a military base in Sharurah province in Saudi Arabia's Najran region. He didn’t provide evidence or say when the attack occurred.

The Saudi civil defense overnight said a projectile fell in al-Tawwal governorate near the border with Yemen along the Red Sea, injuring two people and damaging a mosque and several other buildings. The statement blamed the Houthis. It also said sirens went off in Sharurah province but didn’t report casualties or damage.

There was no Saudi statement Sunday on any new attacks targeting the Houthis, who have been hitting Saudi oil infrastructure and shipping as part of a recently declared blockade.

While the rebels have said there is no threat to other commercial shipping, markets remain wary and oil prices have risen again.

A senior government official in Yemen said its forces will return to the Red Sea coast and fight back, after people fleeing the Houthi advance told The Associated Press they saw forces withdrawing and urging people to run.

Sultan al-Arada, a member of the ruling presidential council, described the collapse of government forces in the port city of Mokha and elsewhere on Yemen’s west coast as “painful and regrettable.”

Al-Arada, also governor of central Marib province, said in the televised interview aired late Saturday that forces “are currently regrouping and will return to the battle in one form or another.”

On Friday, a senior military official with Yemen’s internationally recognized government blamed “lack of coordination” between Yemen’s army and multiple allied militias, saying it gave the Houthis “a priceless opportunity.”

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t allowed to speak to the media, also said they were stunned that the Saudi air force didn't act to prevent the capture of Mokha, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) from the strait.

The National Resistance, a government-allied force, said more than 500 government fighters were killed on the west coast over the past four weeks.

In its first comprehensive toll, the force, which had controlled the coastal areas including Mokha, said about 1,500 others were wounded in the fighting against the Houthis since Aug. 9.

It said in a statement that more than 1,000 Houthis were killed on multiple front lines in the provinces of Hodeida and Taiz.

The National Resistance, which is commanded by Tariq Saleh, a nephew of Yemen’s late leader Ali Abdullah Saleh, vowed to fight back, saying that it will “continue its struggle within the ranks of the armed forces … (until) Yemen is liberated from Iran’s proxies.”

The rebels’ rapid advance has been a major setback both to Yemen’s internationally recognized government and Saudi Arabia, which have been battling the Houthis for 12 years. The latest escalation has ended a ceasefire that had largely stopped fighting across Yemen since 2022.

The advance also puts the Iran-backed rebels just 20 miles (32 kilometers) from the U.S. military base in Djibouti, on the other side of the Bab el-Mandeb. It's the main U.S. base in Africa and one of several foreign military bases in Djibouti, including those of China, France and Japan.

The small Horn of Africa nation is already seeing the arrival of Yemenis making the perilous crossing of the strait. More than 2,000 people have reached Djibouti, the International Organization for Migration said Sunday.

Djibouti's Economy and Finance Minister Ilyas M. Dawaleh, said on X that the country's navy, coast guard and other specialized agencies were conducting rescue operations and providing emergency assistance.

Associated Press writer Omar Farouk in Mogadishu, Somalia, contributed to his report.

This image taken from undated video released by the Ansar Allah Media Office, the media arm of Yemen's Houthi rebels, on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, shows, according to the group, Houthi fighters among vehicles abandoned by Saudi-backed forces during a Houthi advance at an undisclosed location in southern Yemen. (Ansar Allah Media Office via AP)

This image taken from undated video released by the Ansar Allah Media Office, the media arm of Yemen's Houthi rebels, on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, shows Houthi fighters chant after praying beside military vehicles during what the group says was their advance against Saudi-backed forces at an undisclosed location in southern Yemen. (Ansar Allah Media Office via AP)

This image taken from undated video released by the Ansar Allah Media Office, the media arm of Yemen's Houthi rebels, on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, shows Houthi fighters inspecting what the group says is an abandoned position during their advance against Saudi-backed forces at an undisclosed location in southern Yemen. (Ansar Allah Media Office via AP)

People walk at a street in Sanaa, Yemen, Sunday, Sept. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)

Yemeni civilians celebrate while riding in the back of a pickup truck in the Bani Matar district, Yemen, Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, as they follow a convoy carrying Houthi prisoners freed in Mokha on its way to Sanaa following the Houthi takeover of the southern Red Sea port city. (AP Photo/STR)

Displaced Yemenis rest at a temporary shelter in the Dar Saad district of Aden, Yemen, Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, after fleeing Houthi attacks in the western coastal cities of al-Khokha and Mokha. (AP Photo/Abdulnasser Alseddik)

This photo provided by the Saudi Press Agency shows damage to a building after a projectile fell in Al-Tawwal, Jazan, Saudi Arabia, on the southern border with Yemen, Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026. (Saudi Press Agency via AP)