Every few months we will read of a extremely tragic events of people's lives ending tragically because they did not have the time necessary to exit the building because of a fire in their home or smoke inhalation caused by a fire in a home. It happened again in a townhouse located in Duluth, Georgia last night when 3 sister's lost their lives where the residence that they lived in caught fire. All three suffered severe smoke inhalation and burns. They have been identified the children, notified the father which has now flown back from serving his country in Afghanistan to comfort his wife and bury his children.
When home fires happen the planning that you have taken the time to do with your family will be evident. You need to educate your children on how to escape the home in the event of a fire. You should also practice a family exit drill at least twice a year. Exit drills are a great indicator of the ability to exit a building and identifies areas of risk for your family.
Second and third story buildings need to have exit ladders so that children can exit the building from those floors without additional harm. You also need to have the exit ladder accessible and be able to execute the functionality within seconds. An average room in a home will be fully engulfed in flames within a minute so the delay of access to the ladder may also be fatal.
Take the time to educate your family on where smoke extingishers are. check the charge make sure that they are accessible and take your family out to show them how to use them. There may be a time that a very small fire can be extinguished. But small children need to be trained to exit the building.
Most smoke detectors only have a radius of 10 square feet and you should replace them every 10 years. You should have one in every room in the house rather than just a hall way. In the fire above, they believe the fire started in a first level bedroom. By the time anyone heard the fire, it was out of control and the second as well as the third floor access to escape became blocked.
In my opinion, both smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors should be attached to your security system so that they will notify authorities of the presence of smoke or fire. Monitoring has changed and today consists of more than just a phone call to authorities and should ALWAYS be attached to a security system. Most smoke detectors have a 9 volt battery installed in them. You need to replace the batteries twice a year. If you can not do this, ask a neighbor, freind or call your local fire house for assistance. You could also schedule a service call with Rottweiler Security and we will assist by installing them or replace batteries.
Not conducting family fire drills with your family, avoiding smoke detector purchases and placement will just increase the risk of harm or worse for you and your family. Take the time now to address this issue, it may save either your life or maybe a family member too.
