What is beeping in my loft?

[aarghcobwebs]

Or, more accurately... what might be beeping in my loft?

One loud chirrup is sounding every 30 seconds, for (at the moment) intermittent periods; similar to a smoke alarm with battery running low. But there's no alarm visible in there, and I can't locate the exact source of the sound, which is either beneath the boards or behind a chimney flue in a really inaccessible corner. I've sat there in the dark, hoping there's be a little flash of light or something when it beeps, but there's nothing. It's driving me crazy!

Chimney is all sealed and not in use. There are some pipes in the loft, but we have a combi boiler so I don't think we can have a water tank in use up there - maybe an old one?

Would anyone really fit a completely inaccessible smoke alarm in the loft? Or is there some other kind of alarm you might put up there?

Smoke alarm
Carbon monoxide alarm
Pacemaker (inside dead body in loft space)
Nokia phone (in the pocket of the dead person)
Burglar alarm sensor

I have no idea but this is truly a mystery. Definitely coming from up there?

@Grambler 😂😂

An old smoke alarm/carbon monoxide alarm in a box. Same thing happened to us recently and we could here a beeping every 30 seconds.

Is it definitely in your loft? Could it be coming from an adjoining house?

Ghost beeping?

Lots of ideas here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3488553-To-be-driven-mad-by-a-mysterious-beep

Next door neighbours smoke alarm?

I had a smoke detector going off. It drove me round the twist.

Next door's smoke alarm with low battery beeped away whilst they were on holiday once. Took me a couple of days to work out where the noise was coming from after scouring our house for the source.

Thank you everyone! Ironically, after spending half of yesterday in the loft and quietly screaming whenever anything brushed my head (low beams, so many cobwebs), a ginormous fucking spider ran at me while I was reading the linked beeping-noise thread last night.

So: huge spider in living room, under an IKEA tub, and an inexplicable beeping in the loft. I can see no option but to sell this house.

A guy is coming to do our boiler's safety check today, so I will ask him if he has any idea what the beeping might be, but I doubt he's going to be very keen to crawl around the unboarded corner of our loft.

It definitely is in the loft, for those who asked. We have four fire alarms and two carbon monoxide detectors, along with a drawer full of electronic crap, two Alexas, three sets of walkie talkies and several boxes of all-singing-all-dancing baby toys. I spent most of yesterday afternoon standing by each of these in turn and waiting thirty seconds for the beep. It's not them.

It's not any kind of creature, either: definitely a digital-sounding beep, coming every 30 seconds, for periods of about twenty minutes, and it's shrill enough that I think it must come from some sort of alarm (it's not a quiet little blip).

And it's not next-door. The loft isn't very big, but the sound is incredibly, immediately loud in there, and I'm sure it's somewhere near the chimney flue. I'm thinking...

old discarded smoke or carbon monoxide alarm, tossed in there when the rest of the loft got converted

alarm connected to old water system? I've read there are some which detect leaks or empty tanks

some sort of electronic pest deterrent for mice or squirrels

pacemaker within abandoned corpse (thank you for that idea) stuffed inside chimney flue. Has anyone seen Santa Claus recently?

Years ago we used to hear ghostly music from our loft, usually around 11pm. It was definite notes changing pitch.
First thought was it was in our bedroom so we tore that apart and found nothing.
DH was in the loft a few weeks later when he found a winnie the pooh piano DD had as a child. It had worked its way out of a box and become trapped slightly under one of the wooden beams. We concluded that as the beams expanded with the heating etc it was pressing down slightly on the keys and making the noise we heard most nights.

So yes, another option. Check you're not being haunted by Winnie the Pooh.

Have you checked in the gutters?

Do you have any toys stored up there, batteries running low or something pressing against the button?

FOUND IT! Twenty-four hours of intermittent beeping, and I've finally got the fucker. An old smoke alarm had fallen between joists and was half-hidden in insulation.

I'm sorry this isn't a more exciting resolution, but I'm so glad the noise has stopped, and that it had nothing to do with decrepit water tanks, vermin, toxic gas or Winnie the Pooh.

And no dead bodies?