An Old Town scrap metal firm has apologised to neighbours after its ‘excruciating’ burglar alarm tortured residents on Saturday.
The high-pitched wail from Mercia Metals in Wise Street reverberated around streets near the Grand Union Canal for more than an hour after a false alarm at around 3.30pm.
The noise could be heard as far away as Leamington police station in Newbold Terrace and was so loud Priory Street resident Gill McMullen at first thought it was her neighbour’s burglar alarm.
She said: “It’s the worst alarm you can imagine. It’s excruciating. You could hear it at the police station. You couldn’t sit in your house and watch television within a half-mile radius.”
Neighbours fruitlessly tried to call phone numbers on the premises to disable the alarm, but a mobile number was not working and the company whose name was given on the alarm told them it was not registered.
It was not the first time the firm’s alarm had caused a problem. After a similar incident in August 2010, Mercia Metals, whose premises back on to the canal, had changed the phone numbers on their sign to enable neighbours in nearby Gas Street to contact the company about a false alarm.
When contacted by the Courier, owner Robert McGee apologised for any disturbance or inconvenience the alarm had caused neighbours.
He admitted the mobile number for the business had recently changed and the sign had not been updated, but said this had now been rectified, adding that the faulty alarm - one of three at the site - which was supposed to cut off after one minute, would be disabled.
Posted: Sat Dec 03, 2011 1:41 pm