Thunderbolt Pier

The Thunderbolt siren was developed between 1952 and 1990. It was the first "supercharged" siren, which uses a blower to force air into the rotor, to increase the siren's volume by 10 decibels. In the 1980s, when civil defense fell into disuse, Thunderbolts across the United States were repurposed for nuclear and storm warning siren systems. During the Gulf War, Federal Signal sent a number of modified Thunderbolt 1003s to Kuwait to warn its citizens of an air raid. These were the system 7000 series and were only found in Kuwait. Later, Kuwait's sirens were all replaced with Federal Signal Modulators. One system 7000 is on display next to a Federal Signal Modulator at the Kuwait General…

The Thunderbolt comes in several models: the Model 1000 is single tone, while the Model 1000T and Model 1003 are dual tones. The Model 1003 also includes two solenoid-operated control valves, which are used to create the <nowiki></nowiki>Hi-Lo<nowiki></nowiki> and <nowiki></nowiki>Pulse<nowiki></nowiki> signals, which can be used as a fire or tsunami signal. Otherwise, it is identical to the 1000T. There were also 3 types of gas powered Thunderbolts known as the System series, System 7012 is a model Thunderbolt 1000, System 7022 is a model Thunderbolt 1000T. It is identical to 7012, but has a dual-tone chopper. System 7026 uses a model Thunderbolt 1003. There are other system series…