Bankrupt Detroit's Fire Alert System Not Far Advanced from String-and-Can Phone

In one of Detroit’s 32 fire houses, the fire alert consists of a fax machine and a coin-filled pop can. When the alert shoots from the paper feed, it knocks over a coin-filled pop can. Firefighters hear the racket and respond. (Screenshot: Detroit Free Press video)

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How broke is Detroit, whose leaders are pleading their case in federal bankruptcy court to shed $7 million of its $18 billion in unpaid bills?

The answer sounds like something from a stand-up comedy routine.

Detroit is so broke and so woefully behind in technology that firefighters in all 38 fire houses have ginned up noisy alert systems consisting of pop cans, coins, door hinges, pipes and doorbells, the Detroit Free Press reports.

Financially solvent fire departments have modern-day alert systems that trip bells, like Morse code, when an emergency comes in. In one of Detroit’s fire houses, alerts come in by fax, and the paper shooting out of the paper feed knocks over a coin-filled pop can.

In another case, the sheet of paper from the fax machine hits a door hinge, which pulls on a wire and activates a door bell – in kind of the way that the hip bone is connected to the leg bone, which is connected to the foot.

» Watch the Detroit Free Press video to see how it works.

The contraptions work, Detroit Deputy Fire Commissioner John Berlin said, but workers ingenuity came at their own expense: it’s meant that fire department’s technology shortfalls have never been made a priority by the cash-strapped city.

“It sounds unbelievable, but it’s truly what the guys have been doing and dealing with for a long long time,” he said. “We’re in desperate need. We’re probably 30 years behind.”

Berlin made his comments to the Free Press on Friday, after recovery specialist Charles Moore shared the pop-can alert story to illustrate the city’s woeful technology as testimony in the Detroit’s historic $18 billion bankruptcy trial wrapped up for the week.

Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr’s $1.4 billion reinvestment plan to help Michigan’s largest city emerge from bankruptcy includes $42 million for fire department upgrades, including money to bring the department’s technology into the 21st Century.

Acceptance of the plan ultimately rests with federal bankruptcy Judge Steven W. Rhodes in a trial that could continue into October. If he rejects the plan, the city may have to repay its creditors by selling off valuable assets, like pieces in the Detroit Art Institute’s permanent collection. Estimates of the value of Detroit’s art vary, but most put it between $2.8 and $4.6 billion – but it would probably fetch only $1.1 to $1.8 billion on the open market, the Los Angeles Times reports.

“The grand bargain,” as the plan is known, saves the art by giving city retirees smaller pension cuts than they would be offered if they turned down the deal. Retirees approved the plan in July.

The trial resumes Monday.