Fire Alarm at EWR
 

I'm sitting in the big PC at EWR (the newer one). A few minutes ago, the fire alarm went off for several minutes. Part way through, a voice came over a PA system saying "this is only a test, do not panic." Is it just me, or if it was really a test should they have made that announcement before the alarm was sounded? Does anyone know if it was in the whole terminal, or just the PC?
-JMP

Yes, they should have made the announcement before the alarm was sounded.

I'm 2 times zones away from EWR today so I didnt hear it.

:cool:

lie about a test.
 

I'm sure that was a lie about a test. In tests, we always pre-announce. But we'd never test a place of public assembly at noon, where people could get hurt if they exited, or to use the proper emergency exits is violating security rules - causing a complete re-search of all pax, and hours of delays. Try 3 AM. Plus, you would have heard a sequence of alarms, as the test crew moved along the fire alarm zones.

More likely a malicious false alarm, like in high school or college.

We just got back this morning, so I didn't have a chance to respond to this sooner.

On the way to our gate, we did see some rather nasty looking black smoke billowing into the air somewhere not too far away. (We didn't stop to see exactly where it was, but if it wasn't at the terminal, it wasn't far.) We figured that it was likely that the smoke had something to do with the alarm...
-JMP

I was at EWR a little less than a month ago and the fire alarm in a nearby terminal would go off for a few minutes and then stop for a few minutes. This happened probably three times and nobody seemed to notice/care.

Are you sure this was a fire alarm? A lot of doors at airports are alarmed and when someone opens one without proper authorisation it'll alarm. This happens all the time and the alarms often work as well as car alarms -- nobody pays any attention.

I assume that it was a fire alarm because it was that awful buzzing sound accompanied by flashing strobe-type lights that I associate with fire alarms. It could have been a door alarm but in all of the other times I have flown through EWR I never heard/seen this.

I'm convinced this is done to increase your stress and anxiety levels.