Fire Prevention Week urges citizens to prevent home fires
Firefighters teamed up with Domino's pizza to deliver smoke detectors and batteries.
Published Oct. 10, 2008
If your weekend pizza delivery comes to your door with a firefighter, don't worry.
This week marks the 85th Fire Prevention Week, a national program designed to help citizens learn to prevent home fires. The week is sponsored by the National Fire Protection Association and local fire departments.
This weekend, between 6 and 8 p.m., Columbia firefighters will ride with select Domino's Pizza delivery drivers in Columbia.
Firefighters will ask the occupants if they have working smoke alarms and an escape plan. If they do, Domino's will reward residents with free food. And if they don't, firefighters will provide replacement batteries and smoke alarms.
The food giveaway is just one part of Fire Prevention Week. Starting on Monday, Columbia firefighters visited numerous local elementary schools to talk to children about the importance of fire safety in their homes.
"We do some theatrical productions that takes folks from some of the junior highs and the high schools and gets them in to the elementary schools, and it's basic fire prevention program," CFD Capt. Eric Hartman said. "It's something that the kids really seem to attach to and they get the message that we're trying to get out there, which is fire safety and how to put out fires in their homes and what to do should they have a home fire."
The goal of Fire Prevention Week is preventing fires at homes and making sure everyone follows the right preventative measures.
Statistics from the national association, gathered from fire departments across the country, show that 80 percent of fire deaths in the country occur where people often feel safe and relaxed - in their homes. In 2006, more than 2,500 people died in home fires and more than 12,500 suffered injuries.
Recent numbers also show an increase in fires in college residence halls. According to the association's data, the number of fires jumped from a low of 1,800 in 1998 to 3,300 in 2005. From 2000 through 2005 there were 39 deaths and nearly 400 injuries.
Hartman recommends MU students living on and off campus follow some simple safety measures.
"One of the biggest things obviously has to do with candles," he said. "You don't have those candles in your dorm rooms especially if they are left unattended. We have a significant number of fires each year citywide that are caused by unattended candles or candles that fail."
Cooking mishaps are another common theme in fires across the city.
"Another significant fire cause for fires in the city is unattended cooking, so we want to make sure that you don't leave that cooking unattended," Hartman said. "Don't go sit on your sofa, start talking on the phone, or if you're tired and fall asleep, that sort of thing, and before you know it you've got a fire."
According to the CFD, 72 percent of dorm fires are caused by unattended cooking equipment such as microwaves, electric grills and hotplates. For prevention, the Department of Residential Life bans all hotplates, electric grills and candles from residence halls. However, microwaves and overloaded power outlets are still a constant danger.
"We can't emphasize enough the importance of smoke detectors, especially in apartments and dorms," Hartman said. "You want to make sure at an absolute bare minimum that you do have a smoke detector on each level of the home and outside of each sleeping area, and then make sure that those detectors have batteries in them and are operational."
