Times: Key found to riddle of the car alarms
Sufaud
The Times
August 21, 2004
Key found to riddle of the car alarms
From Chris Ayres in Las Vegas
AT FIRST the motorists of Las Vegas and neigbouring Henderson
suspected that machines had taken over the world: thousands of car
alarms, central-locking systems and remote garage door openers
simultaneously stopped working.
Local car dealerships were overwhelmed by calls from angry customers.
"We were getting a hundred calls a day," said Katie Baumann, a service
operator at the Ford Country dealership in Henderson, told the Las
Vegas Sun.
"I tried every button everywhere. I couldn't get it to lock. I
couldn't get it to unlock," said Bill Zawistowski, one frustrated
motorist. "Nothing I could do would make it work."
After nearly six months, the riddle of the malfunctioning alarms and
central locking systems has this week been solved by two engineers
from Ford. The cause turned out to be a faulty "search and rescue"
radio signal repeater located 4,000ft up nearby Frenchman Mountain,
accessible only by four-wheel-drive vehicle. The radio tower had
accidentally started broadcasting at 315 megahertz, the same frequency
used by most remote control keyfobs.
"The repeater had been stuck on transmit probably since its last use
during the winter," said Maurice Durand, of Ford. "The relatively
strong nature of the signal produced the interference with many of the
remote entry keyfobs."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,175-1225811,00.html