All the bells – Ringing out the start of the 2012 Olympics

Starting the bells

Starting the bells

Last Friday, as part of the build up to the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics we were at the “All the Bells” event in Beverley’s Wednesday Market.

The event was led by the East Riding’s Town Crier Michael Wood, Three Times World Champion Town Crier and Britain’s Loudest Town Crier.

At 8.12am, hundreds of residents, many with hand bells, created a mass of noise for 3 minutes.

At the end of the 3 minutes, Michael Wood led three cheers to the Olympics and TeamGB.

As part of the event, we measured the noise from the 3 minutes of bells as well as from Michael himself!

Over the 3 minutes of the event, we measured an LAeq of 92.7dB!

To show how loud a hand bell can be, we also measured Michael ringing a bell at close range which gave us an LAFmax of 120dB(A)!

Ringing the bells

Ringing the bells

Cirrus has been involved with measuring noise from Town Criers over the past few years, and in 2010, Cirrus measured the noise levels at the British Town Crier Championships in Bridlington where we measured Michael’s Cry at almost 105dB!

There’s some further press coverage about the event on the following links:

http://www.thisishullandeastriding.co.uk/Ding-dong-East-Yorkshire-rings-London-2012/story-16609127-detail/story.html

http://www.hu17.net/all-the-bells-crowds-make-a-right-ding-dong-in-wednesday-market/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAXxTJQVbU0

Michael Wood and the Beverley Garland Dancers

Michael Wood and the Beverley Garland Dancers

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