The Ministry of Defence is buying additional air raid warning sirens for RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, capable of covering both the base and the neighbouring Akrotiri village, the department stated in a contract award notice.
The notice, identifier 2026/S 000-077006, was published on 13 August 2026 and records the award decision as taken the same day. The contract is worth £800,000 and runs for five years from 26 October 2026, with the earliest signature date given as 25 August.
According to the notice, the requirement exists to supplement sirens already installed at the base. The new system must produce distinct alert tones, covering an air raid or imminent threat and an all clear, and must carry both live and recorded voice announcement functionality. It has to be portable and able to work independently of any fixed infrastructure, which is what the title’s reference to rapid deployability means in practice.
The award covers supply, commissioning, documentation, training, warranty and through-life support. Two tenders were received under an open procedure, both from small and medium-sized enterprises, with one supplier successful.
The contract went to Acoustic Technologies, trading as ATI Systems, an American company based in Boston. Contracting was handled by British Forces Cyprus headquarters at Episkopi.
RAF Akrotiri sits within the Western Sovereign Base Area on the south coast of Cyprus and is the RAF’s permanent operating base in the eastern Mediterranean. It has supported British air operations across the region for decades, most recently as the launch point for Typhoon strikes against Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria under Operation Shader, and for the RAF sorties flown against Houthi targets in Yemen during 2024.
Its position roughly 100 miles from the Syrian coast and within reach of Lebanon, Israel and the wider Levant places it closer to regional conflicts than any other permanent British base. The Sovereign Base Areas are British territory retained under the 1960 treaty that granted Cyprus independence, and Akrotiri village lies inside the boundary, meaning the base authorities have a civilian population to warn as well as service personnel.
Well that resolves the problem.
It resolves A problem.. let’s not be facetious over everything.. an AE department needs bandages as well as access to CT scanners…
😁🙄. Ummm … er … evidently 2.7% of GDP permits acquisition of additional air raid sirens. Awesome. Wonder what percentage would allow the purchase of actual GBAD? RAF personnel satisfied w/ projected timeline? 🤔😉
This base will test the mettle of the UK forces in Cyprus and is a fortuitous turn of events. What an opportunity to test new detection systems before rollout to other services. Sadly, this airbase is on Iran’s radar of likely retaliatory targets and the UK needs to be ready.
Always loved the sound of air raid sirens, reminds me of home. Growing up in Teesside I used to hear them weekly when the chemical works where testing them. Was always funny when friends from out of town came to visit and got freaked out.
I believe Broadmoors used to be tested every Wednesday incase a nutter got out. I only heard it once.
We have 2 chemical sites in Teesside (well 2 that have alarm systems) i believe Billingham was tested on Wednesday and Wilton on Friday.
Not an area I have much clue about, what sirens are available to CNI.
Seems very sensible with potential for chemical leaks!
I think nuclear sites all have similar, and places like Devonport where nuclear Submarines are present.
More widely, the national warning system was dismantled post Cold War, and the Emergency Alerts to your phone are now in place.
It’s all mostly remnants from when it was ICI, I believe at one point Teesside had the highest concentration of chemical works on the plants. Add to that 2 nuclear plants (1 commercial and 1 private) no wonder we teessiders are like cockroaches and will be able to survive a nuclear fallout.
Unfortunately it’s all a bit rundown now, when ICI collapsed a bunch of companies bought the works and just run them into the ground and didn’t bother maintaining or upgrading them, just squeezed as much profit out of them as possible and left them in ruin.
Shame. I hope Burnham is more than just talk and reindustrialises.
Coincidentally my Wife used to love visiting Redcar for some reason?!
My Dad worked at ICI Billingham back in the day. If anybody had said to him when he retired that within his lifetime, ICI would cease to exist, he would have completely rejected such an outlandish idea. But then, I started my working life in shipbuilding… I too hope that Burnham is more than just talk, we will find out in due course.
Still one at Leonardo Helicopters DM. Gets used every 11 Nov at 11:00.
It did as a child I grew up in Crowthorne village. 10 hrs every Monday morning 16 sirens around the Bracknell, Wokingham, Camberley and Ascot areas would go off at that time. Crowthorne siren was next Crowthorne railway Station.
We had 4 escapes when I loved in Crowthorne, each time I was at primary school locked down until the all clear.
Correct. Yes Monday at 10. I seem to recall one of the escapees was abroad by the time they noticed he was gone. So not that useful in my opinion.
I wasn’t aware of that incident Mark, could possibly be after my time as I left Crowthorne in 1982 to join the Air Force.
1981 I believe. Can remember road blocks coming back that day. Apparently his girlfriend drove him away quickly.
Cheers Mark, I don’t remember that one, perhaps because at 19 years of age I felt bullet proof, a far cry from the primary school age, you know boogie monsters and all.
It looks like we were almost neighbours if you ignore a chunk of forest. I spent my teenage years on the Camberley side just to the rear of the Staff College as was. Small world.
I always thought the boogie monster was Jimmy Saville who I believe spent far too much time at Broadmoor as a visitor whereas perhaps he should have been a patient. I moved away decades ago but still have family in the area.
I will have been 20 in 1981 but as with you already drifting away as work took me.
Saville! That man haunted me as a child he would be at the gate at primary school dressed as Santa’s and i would see him in the high St on one of his runs. My father worked for the BBC, my brothers and sisters and I spent a day doing a TOP of The pops commercial at the BBC theatre with other children, Saville was comparing it.
The man was obnoxious and my father kept a very close eye on us which was unusual.
I spoke to my mother about Saville when it all came out. She told me everyone knew not just the BBC, he wasn’t the only one, she never understood how it was kept so secret.
Taught me an important lesson at an early age. Forgot the fame and fortune – do you like or trust a person.
I can remember watching Jim’ll fix it and my Dad casually asked if I thought I would ever want to write in. I replied “probably not” to which he casually responded “I think that’s very wise”. I disliked him, he was gross and that stupid chair made him look ridiculous.
As you say I think a lot of people knew way beyond the BBC and I think that the word got around. It was only gossip, possibly, but I’m guessing had I actually written in something would have been lost in the post. Parents were as you say actively looking to protect their children.
Mark F, perhaps your parents should have reported their suspicions to the Police?
It actually went off when Burnham “bluffer of the North” got his nose in the top trough!
Ooooo good one.
I’m happy to give him a chance mate. He’s playing Farages game as being seen as a people’s man on the street PM to be popular, I don’t blame him for that, after the wet rag in charge before.
Yesterday’s COBRA was pretty groundbreaking though…. He’s “considering” a ban on disposable BBQs after all….
How about banning them, and finding billions to build more reservoirs, buy fire fighting kit for planes, build desalination plants, and so on.
Actual action?
Hi Daniele, you will probably know by now that the sale of disposable BBQs is now banned. That makes more sense than encouraging folk not to use them. As for fire fighting planes, etc. there was a fleeting mention of them on the BBC news (apparently Andy is considering them) but it seems to have disappeared.
Evening.
Yes, got the alert.
Something.
Not enough, this is only going to continue going forward.
Why not convert some of the soon to be retired Chinooks into fire fighters? There’s one (or two? ) over in France from Aus fighting bush fires now.
Agreed mate, he has always made the effort to be “popular” and a man of the people! However he is a lightweight compared to Farage as Farage does seen genuine while Burnham is a one dimensional socialist with a documented history of socialist opinion and action.
All Burnhams actions since mugging of the leftist sheep of Makerfield have been low level giveaways in preparation for an early GE! He knows he has no mandate and as these economic illiterate clowns want to raise more tax, the will need a measure of credibility and a “win” in an early GE will give them that. However they are running scared, as their bullshit excuses for a no show candidate (as with the greens etc) regarding the Clacton local elections shows! Never have I seen so many election signs and notices for a single party as I have seen in clacton. The 9K votes for the bin head clown is all the Tory, Libs, Greens votes put together. With Farage increasing his majority despite the disrespect the other party’s have shown for the mainly white working class of Clacton, it’s a snapshot of the realtime thinking of the people of the UK. 👍 er as for the article in question, more sirens please 😵💫
Yes, Clacton was hillarious.
Did you note how it was the longest list on a ballot?
And how not one maimstream news channel asked why?
No coincidence for me, just another underhand establishment job to discredit, ridicule, and undermine.
And of course binhead had all the other parties voters, that too was obvious.
On another note, but still the same leftist madness, that ultra left MP now complaining that thousands of illegal immigrant males are to be moved into her constituency at the cut RAF Linton on Ouse.
The HYPOCRICY!!!!
She’s called for unlimited numbers before and now your a nimby.
Well well …….
When ‘the Wolfman’ escaped?
Devonport test theirs weekly due to the nuclear site. Familiar sound to Janners living in the vicinity.
I hope sirens are also provided at Episkopi which is just up the road on the other side of the SLS, itself a military target, and Dhekelia and Ayios Nikolios as well in the ESBA. All have suburban areas attached.
Hardened aircraft shelters and a SAM battery would make more sense…..??
Surely in a struggling Army with its own AD issues, it would make sense to reinforce the RAF Regt with the same equipment, to free up RA formations to be deployed with the Field Army ?
Agreed.
GBAD should return to the RAF Regiment so the RA GBAD assets there can return to their primary role with the Field Army and the ARRC.
HAS were all built in the 70s 80s with NATO funding I recall, I’d be interested in their cost these days. But agree, not having HAS at Akrotiri but sun shelters surrounded by a crude pallisade is very poor, considering the hardware regularly deployed there.
True.. but sirens are needed as well.. as long as it’s sirens and GBAD.
Agree with Daniele..the raf reg needs to have GBAD available for all airbases.
Naval bases ought to have some RAF regiment equivalent too. Deployable when needed.
I think the threat to Akrotiri and other bases in the ME is about to get worse.
Iran has bounced back from the US/Israeli bomb damage and is producing ballistic missiles again
In recent days, there has also been a big reshuffle of top IRGC commanders and new directives from the Supreme leader, suggesting they are done with talking and readying for a long war.
While Iran’s civilians are suffering financially from the US blockade/sanctions, it appears the IRGC is still flush with money
and has plenty of means to rebuild their losses and carry on a long war.
The US has to radically revise it’s strategy otherwise, the world will have to face a stronger and more emboldened Iranian regime.
West will always lose these wars, Irans and other countries have a far higher tolerance level for violence than any western country, we don’t even have tolerance level for inflciting causalties on the enemy lets alone taking any oursleves. And its not just casualties, hit bridge and your own allies call foul.
Herodotus (c. 440 BC): Wrote “soft lands breed soft men” the meaning was that fertile, easy lands do not produce fierce warriors. Thats where the West is today. Although I prefer G. Michael Hopf 2016 quote “Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times”
We have US sailors who are now reporting mental health issues whilst Iranians REvolution Guards are wringing their hands saying bring it on.