Have To Hear This, Very Odd Sounding Sirens in Italy

[The Owl]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aQdBk71aNQ&search=Siren

What could these particular noisemakers be?

[Ola]

Don?t know the type of siren but almost every ambulanses in Italy sounds that way. It?s electronic anyway.
Ola

[Whelen Rules]

this appears to be some kind of mechanical horn with solinoids mabe? it sure sounds wierd though. I believe this has been brought up before.

[SirenMadness]

It's probably a siren with about six ports, along with an air-horn.

[Daniel]

It is probably the local version of the compressor-powered German Martinshorn, tuned to a 6th interval rather than a perfect 4th, with one valve stuck open. I would think that the low tone would ordinarily alternate with the high tone. Sirens like this were once standard throughout Europe, but in the last decade, American-style electronic sirens have become common in places like the UK, Ireland, and Russia, as well as other types of electronic three-tone (high-mid-high-low) sirens becoming popular in places like the Netherlands. Some air horn sirens had different patterns like "low-high-low..........."low-high-low", which is common on French ambulances, or the quick "hi-looooooow-hi-lo-hi-lo-hi-lo," which was used in Eastern Europe. There was even an electronic siren unique to the former East Germany, having a high-low sound in which the siren rose to the high note and fell to the low note at the same rate as a regular high-low siren, but with a weird, gliding portamento effect.

[Jim_Ferer]

The problem with the ambulance hypothesis is that it seems clear to me that the sound source isn't moving, and it's awful loud for an ambulance.

[Ola]

I have seen them live in Italy when i were there last year, so i know in fact that it is an ambulance.