There was a huge thunderstorm in Las Vegas last week, with flooding. Here is a story from today's Las Vegas Sun. I liked the part about people downloading apps to their smart phones to check the decibel levels:

"Go back to last Thursday night: Big thunderstorms rolling across the (Las Vegas) valley forced a bunch of flights to be canceled at the airport.

Normally, people don’t stay overnight at McCarran. On this night, hundreds did.

It was also the night scheduled for a routine test of the fire alarm system.

It started at 2 a.m. Ascending woop-woop-woops interlaced with a constant buzzing and accompanied by strobe lights were topped off with conflicting messages — one blaring that the incident was being investigated and to “remain calm,” followed by the other not-so-satisfying announcement that this was only a test and the alarm could be disregarded.

If only.

The test went on, not for 15 minutes or 30 minutes or for an hour, but for three hours.

Woop! Woop! Woop! Buzz! Remain calm! Disregard!

Did we mention that it went on for three hours? And that the victims of this audio assault were travelers already in a bad mood because of canceled flights and having to spend the night at McCarran?

Woop! Woop! Woop! Buzz! Remain calm! Disregard!

Don Cooper, an electrical engineer flying back to Portland after visiting the Grand Canyon, says travelers grew so angry that they began calling the airport on their cellphones.

“I talked to a gentleman who said his name was Operator 172,” Cooper says. “I was pleading with him to have the alarm turned off.”

Operator 172 said the alarms were set to run until 5 a.m. “and there was absolutely no way he could change it.”

Some travelers downloaded applications onto their smartphones that measured decibel levels. This one came in at 95. Think circular saw or a jackhammer at 50 feet. Sustained exposure to 90 to 95 decibels can, according to experts, result in hearing loss.

“It was unbearable,” Cooper says.

Airport spokesman Chris Jones says it was unfortunate that stalled travelers were in the airport at the time of the alarm test; usually the place is all but empty between 2 and 5 a.m. But the test could neither be delayed nor halted once it began because of the two days of planning that involved the fire department.

“This was a required life-safety training event, and having people in the terminal at that time of night was an abnormal situation,” he says."