Category Archives: Fire Prevention

7 Tips To Keep Your Holiday Season Safe, Merry and Bright

Posted on by
Reply

By Sam Pudelski, Red Cross volunteer

The holiday season is upon us and for some, decorations are already trimming their homes. While December is known as the most wonderful time of the year, it’s also the peak time for home fires. 

The American Red Cross has put together some simple safety tips to help protect your home and family.

  • Opt for battery-operated candles. If you do use candles, never leave burning candles unattended and keep them away from anything that can burn. Make sure to keep candles out of reach of children and pets.
  • Inspect all holiday light cords to make sure they aren’t broken or frayed. Avoid stringing too many strands of lights together. You should not have more than three light strings per extension cord.
  • Make sure all outdoor decorations are made for outdoor use. Fasten lights securely to your home, trees and bushes. If you’re using any metal fasteners, like hooks or nails, make sure they are insulated to help prevent electrocution or fire hazard.
  • If you have an artificial tree or garland, check for a fire-resistant label. Keep them away from fireplaces, radiators and other sources of heat. Never use electric lights on metallic trees.
  • If you plan to get a live tree, test its needles to make sure it is fresh. Bend the needles on the tree up and down to make sure no needles fall off. Make sure to water the tree regularly to prevent it from drying out.
  • Don’t hang stockings or decorations on the mantel if you plan to light the fireplace.
  • Install smoke alarms on every level of your home and outside each sleeping area. Test your alarms once a month and replace the batteries at least once per year. Additionally, you should practice your two-minute fire safety plan with everyone in your household.

If you cannot afford smoke alarms or aren’t physically able to install one, the Red Cross may be able to help. You can request a smoke alarm from the Northern Ohio Region of the Red Cross here.

As temperatures drop, heat your home safely

Posted on by
Reply

By Tim Poe, American Red Cross volunteer

I arrived home after jogging through a cool drizzle in fading gray light and heard the furnace’s low hum, recently woken from summer slumber. That sound will be a familiar undertone over the next few months, so I remembered to double check the filters and vents and schedule maintenance. As an American Red Cross volunteer, I have seen that forgetting these tasks can have tragic results, especially when space heaters are used, as they are involved in most fatal home heating fires.

As temperatures drop, the risk of home fires increases. Home fires account for most disasters to which the Red Cross responds, especially in Northern Ohio, and responses increase 30% during cold months. In 2022, for instance, the Northern Ohio Red Cross responded to 345 home fires in the last three months of the year, compared to 249 from July through September. And in just the first 15 days of October 2023, Northern Ohio Red Cross teams responded to 33 events, all home fires, and assisted 115 people.

To help keep you and your loved ones safe, here are a few home heating safety tips:

  • Have at least three feet of space between heating equipment and children, pets and anything that can burn. Most home heating fire tragedies occur when flammable items like furniture, rugs, bedding, and drapes are too close.
  • If you must use a space heater, never leave it unattended. Place it on a level, hard and nonflammable surface, such as a ceramic tile floor. Again, keep it away from anything flammable.
  • Look for models that automatically shut off if the heater falls over.
  • Plug space heaters directly into outlets, never into an extension cord, and turn it off when you leave the room or go to sleep.
  • Never use a cooking range or oven to heat your home.
  • Never leave a fire burning in the fireplace unattended. Make sure any embers are extinguished before going to bed or leaving home. Use a glass or metal fire screen to keep embers in the fireplace.
  • Have furnaces, chimneys, fireplaces, wood, and coal stoves inspected annually by a professional and cleaned if necessary.

Additional information and tips are available at redcross.org/fire, including an escape plan. You can also download free apps at redcross.org/apps.

Red Cross efforts to help prevent home fires and save lives when they occur have had tremendous success. The Home Fire Campaign—including Sound the Alarm, which originated in Northern Ohio—is credited for saving at least 1,969 lives since October 2014, 22 of them in Northern Ohio.

If you would like to request a smoke alarm or read more information about the Home Fire campaign, please click here.

Edited by Glenda Bogar, Red Cross volunteer

Posted by Ryan Lang, Red Cross volunteer and board member

Protecting what matters most in Northern Ohio

Posted on by
Reply

October 8 – 14 is National Fire Prevention Week

By Doug Bardwell, American Red Cross volunteer

Unless you live near a fire station, you might be surprised by how many fires occur in
Northern Ohio. Where we live in Strongsville, you can usually detect that single
siren driving down Royalton Road as an EMS ambulance. But, if you hear multiple
sirens and the sound of large diesel engines, you know the entire squad is responding
to yet another fire – and they are usually home fires.

The Red Cross works with local fire departments to help prevent home fires

The most common home fires are caused by cooking. Every year, firefighters respond
to more than 170,000 kitchen fires, causing hundreds of deaths, thousands of injuries
and more than $1 billion in damages each year.

Since 2015, would you believe the American Red Cross in Northern Ohio has
responded to more than 11,000 home fires, and assisted nearly 17,000 families?
Despite insurance or Red Cross financial assistance, think of the inconvenience of
being displaced for weeks or months before your home is habitable again after a fire.

Damage caused by fire to a home in East Cleveland in 2022

There’s a better way

Following these simple tips, you and your family can help prevent kitchen fires:

  1. Use a timer to remind yourself that the stove or oven is on.
  2. Keep anything that can catch fire — potholders, oven mitts, wooden utensils,
    paper or plastic bags, food packaging, towels or curtains — away from your
    stove, oven or any other appliance in the kitchen that generates heat.
  3. Always check the kitchen before going to bed or leaving the home to make
    sure all stoves, ovens, and small appliances are turned off.
  4. Install a smoke alarm near your kitchen, on each level of your home, near
    sleeping areas, and inside and outside bedrooms if you sleep with doors closed. Use the test button to check it each month. Replace all batteries at least once a year if your smoke alarm requires it.
  5. Tap here for another half dozen sensible tips to avoid kitchen fires.
A Red Cross volunteer installs a smoke alarm in a home in Cleveland, with guidance from a firefighter

Smoke alarms are crucial in saving lives

The Northern Ohio region of Red Cross has been installing free smoke alarms for those who need them since 1992. To date, more than 200,000 alarms have been
installed.

Nationally, the Red Cross and partners, through the Home Fire Campaign, have installed 2.6 million alarms in more than 1.1 million households since 2014.

Do they really make that much difference?

Verifiably – yes, they do. As of August 31, 1,928 lives nationwide were documented as
saved due to work done by the Red Cross and partners through the Home Fire
Campaign.

For five more ways you can help the Red Cross continue this valuable practice in Northern Ohio communities, tap here.

If you’d like trained Red Cross volunteers to offer you valuable home fire safety
information to help YOU prevent a fire in your home – and/or to install smoke alarms in
your home, tap here.

Posted by Ryan Lang, Red Cross board member and volunteer