Ep. 38 Smoke Alarms and Residential Life Safety with Lt. Patrick Crawford, City of Westlake Fire Department

Greetings everyone, this is Dave with Mighty Line Minute. I'm here today with a special guest, Lieutenant Patrick Crawford of the City of Westlake, Ohio Fire Department. And he's going to help us talk about fire detection, smoke detection, early warning, and emergency planning for the home environment. I'm really pleased to have him here. 

Patrick, I want to thank you for taking the time to spend with us today. So welcome, and, what's new with your role and what you do for the City of Westlake, and how can we get people to do the right thing at home?

Well, thanks for having me, Dave. I appreciate the opportunity to talk to you and your audience. There's a saying that goes, "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." So, obviously we're very reactive in responding to emergencies, but it's important to be proactive as well. And have the citizens of our city plan for emergencies and have early detection and warning devices and things like that. 

I know in the city myself having been a person that's spent a lot of time in Westlake, to know that there's been fires here that have affected many people, sometimes unfortunate events. What are the things that people can do at home to plan for fire or other emergencies such as we had recently with tornadoes coming through the city? 

Well, in regards to fire, one of the most important things that you can have is a working smoke alarm. So. for example, I have some smoke alarms here that we actually provide to citizens that would otherwise, maybe potentially have difficulty affording them like an elderly individual on a fixed income or something like that. But, according to statistics, you are 55% less likely to die in a home structure fire if there's a working smoke alarm presence. So, having a working smoke alarm in sufficient numbers, properly installed, is really important. So, some of the things that you'd want to look for is, there's two different types. There's photoelectric and there's ionization. And they work a little bit differently. But, either one that you have, it's important to have them. 

And for example, many of them nowadays, if you're looking for one, you know, we used to tell people to change the batteries every time the clocks change, every six months. A lot of them have a 10-year battery now. They're just sealed units like these ones here, they're sealed. You don't have to worry about the batteries. You just have to test them monthly to make sure they're still in the operation. These will be good for 10 years. 

Another thing that you want to look for is to make sure that they are certified by a recognized testing agency like these ones on the back, as these have been tested by Intertek or Underwriters Laboratories is another one that you see a lot of. So, yeah, working smoke alarms, very important to reduce fatalities and to alert occupants and wake them up or get them out of the structure. So that's the most important thing you can do is have a working smoke alarms. 

I've noticed that you brought up intentionally the 10-year life. I'm glad to hear that because, from my personal experience, those 9-volt batteries, especially with power outages, that sort of thing. You can fail a battery pretty quickly, to begin chirping. Oftentimes people just disconnect the battery, pull the battery out and they don't have you know, it connected, whereas the 10-year you've got a much longer life. And, some of these homes don't have the fully-wired detectors either. So, is that principally the case, most people, unless you have a new home? 

Yeah, so, it seems like most newer construction homes are beginning more and more to be equipped with the hardwired and interconnected alarms, which, which those are great. The interconnected alarms are great because, with these single station alarms that are operated by battery, if one goes off in my basement and I'm upstairs on the second floor sleeping, I might not hear it. The interconnected alarms, when one alarms, the rest of them in the home will alarm. And a lot of newer construction homes come with those. My home was built prior to that but, I was able to get wireless interconnected alarms. So they work wirelessly. They still take a battery. They're not hardwired into the home's electrical system, but when one goes off, it sends a signal to the others and they all alarm. 

So, what about carbon monoxide has your best to have an integrated CO with annunciation with CO or carbon monoxide and or fire or, can you have separate CO detection, or does it really matter, as long as you've got it? 

Yeah, I can't endorse a particular product, but I would say that if you had one, whether it's a dual unit or it's a standalone unit, it's just good to have one, especially in living areas of the home like places you'd be sleeping. Yeah. So, they do make the multi-purpose units, and I do have some of those in my own home. But it doesn't mean you have to go replace all of your smoke alarms if your smoke alarms don't have that feature. You can go to the store and get just a standalone carbon monoxide detector. Now the caveat with those is, most CO detectors are only good for 7 years, where smoke alarms are good, typically for 10 years. So, if it was a dual unit smoke and CO, you'd have to replace it probably at seven years, where a smoke alarm would be good for 10. 

Okay. That's good advice. What about planning, with children? What can families do to educate their children as to what to do? Do you have any way to educate those folks? 

Yeah. So, one thing that's big with children is I know when I was a kid, I was afraid to sleep with the door closed. Yeah, but it's, it's important to sleep with the door closed. There's a, I believe it was UL who went in with NFPA, and they did those tests, and they found that you can significantly decrease the amount of fire spread if you just close the door. Even just a simple, hollow-core door can limit fire spread for many minutes. So, it's important for all family members to sleep with the door closed. 

Again, like I said, make sure they have those working smoke alarms so that if something does happen, they know. And to always know two ways out. So have two escape routes. One thing we typically will tell children is, you know, feel the door. If it's hot, don't open it. Go to a window and wait for the fire department. You know, if it's a single-story or something like that, where they could escape, by all means we would encourage any citizen to rescue themselves to the best of their ability. But, if they can get to a window, don't open it because more oxygen feeds fire, but you know, somehow make their presence known. When we get there and we walk around the home, cause we're always going to do a 360 when we get there, if we see somebody in a window, we can real-quick, grab a ladder, throw it up and get them out. 

So, I'm probably one of the few guys that put in one of those chain ladders out of the kids' bedrooms, and they always remember that when I built the house I put a header in there that you could actually lag bolt it into the inside of the room and then throw it out the window. It wasn't too bad for the older kids, but for the younger one to go down that was a little concerning, but not everyone takes that effort to go that far with their emergency escape. I think that's also a consideration for those who are able. 

Yeah, it's funny. That sounds like something I would do. That's my mother-in-law and my family members, they joke, and even my kids call me Mr. Safety Man, because I'm always concerned with, you know, even when we go on vacation, do we know how to get out of the hotel room? Do we know where the exits are? If we stay at an AirBnb, I'm making sure the smoke alarms worked before we go to bed at night. So, yeah, that sounds like something I think I would do when my daughters get a little bit older .. I would probably I'd consider getting them one of those ladders that you can throw out the window. 

Yeah (so). Yeah, well, good advice here. So, I mentioned that we had had some high winds recently, a lot of people lost power. Is there anything that we can add to the smoke detection and fire detection and egress to the list of "be prepared" items that you might make some comment about? You've had some great experience recently. 

Yeah. August 6th, I believe it was. Two confirmed tornadoes that went either very near our area or into our city. 

And three others in Cleveland. 

Right, yeah, there were multiple tornadic events throughout the region. Like I said, two of them impacting us directly. It was the busiest day in our department's history. We responded to over 130 calls for service. We're not a huge department, we're staffed with 10 guys on duty, 24 hours a day. So, 130 calls for service for trees down, power lines down, people trapped in cars by power lines that had fallen. 

And did they do the right thing? 

Yeah. So, if you're not injured, obviously if there's no imminent life threat like the vehicles on fire, then you know, you obviously want to stay in the vehicle until we can confirm that the power has been de-energized before we attempt an evacuation from the vehicle. 

I think we came through that pretty well from a life safety standpoint. A lot of credit to the fire service and the emergency responders, so thank you for all that you guys do. You've got a really important job and function here in the community. I'm just really pleased to see that we can feel confident that the right people are on the job. 

Thanks. Yeah, we appreciate the support. And, to that end, I'll say it was good that we didn't have any significant injuries related to the storm. And even in the days after the storm, when people are dealing with not having electricity for a long time, you see more generator use, which of course increases hazards of carbon monoxide events. Or even fire from spilled fuels and things like that. So, fortunately, I can't recall an incident where we had any residents running generators inside their garages, or too close to their homes. But of course, after an event like that, if you're going to be using a generator, make sure it's away from the home, at least 20 feet away. Probably got more noise complaints. 

Right.

Yeah, you don't want to be overloading the circuits and things like that. So, from a preparedness standpoint, you know, it's great to have some fresh water on hand, and just make sure your phone batteries are charged if they can be. Have emergency lighting. 

And a little extra food, maybe food that doesn't need to be refrigerated? 

Non-perishable food, yeah. And like I said emergency lighting so that we're not using candles, too, for elimination.

Patrick, I really appreciate the opportunity to take time with us today, to educate our listeners on the value of fire and life safety and what you can do to help manage any risks that you do have in the home environment. And at some point in the future, we might talk more about industrial safety and commercial buildings. That's a unique risk, and having seen what can happen in those large occupancies. That'll be a story for another day, but again, thank you. Thank you for what you do. 

Have yourself a safe day. And the truck has stayed here the whole time we're here so that's good news. Keep doing what you're doing. 

Thank you, appreciate it. Thanks for your time. 

All right. Thank you everyone. And we'll see you on another Mighty Line Minute. Take care.