The Hard-Wired Truth About Smoke Alarms
Just search the Internet for smoke alarm news, and you’ll see headline after headline reminding us of their virtue when present or the heartbreak when not.
According to the NFPA (National Fire Protection Association), a home fire occurs every 93 seconds, and seventy-five percent of all fire deaths were caused by home fires. The NFPA also finds that the risk of dying in reported home structure fires is 55 percent lower in homes with working smoke alarms than in homes with no alarms or none that worked.
This makes the argument for having smoke alarms in every home overwhelming.
“Every year in the United States, about 2,000 people lose their lives in residential fires. In a fire, smoke and deadly gases tend to spread farther and faster than heat. That’s one reason why most fire victims die from inhalation of smoke and toxic gases, not from burns. A majority of fatal fires happen when families are asleep because occupants are unaware of the fire until there is not adequate time to escape. A smoke alarm stands guard around the clock, and when it first senses smoke, it sounds a shrill alarm. This often allows a family the precious, but limited, time needed to escape.”1
1 Smoke Alarms – Why, Where, and Which? CPSC. https://www.cpsc.gov/s3fs-public/SmokeAlarmWhyWhereandWhichCPSCPub559RevisedJuly2016PostReview.pdf
What’s more, three out of every five home fire deaths result from the home not having a smoke alarm or one that doesn’t work. That means the death rate in homes with fire alarms is about half that of those without or with non-working units. And of the home fires with non-working units, almost a quarter of the units failed due to dead batteries! When installing smoke alarms, it is important to have one in each bedroom, outside each sleeping area, and on every level of the home, including the basement. For the best protection, interconnect all smoke alarms. This means when one smoke alarm sounds, they all sound. It is also imperative to test your smoke alarm at least once a month using the test button located on the alarm.