“Smoke Alarms: A Sound You Can Live With!” is NFPA’s official theme for Fire Prevention Week (FPW), October 3-9, 2010. If you’re wondering why NFPA, the official sponsor of FPW for nearly 90 years, is focusing on smoke alarms when most homes already have at least one, you've come to the right place!
This year's campaign is designed to educate people about the importance of smoke alarms and encourages everyone to take the steps necessary to update and maintain their home smoke alarm protection.
Installation

• At least one smoke alarm should be located on every level of the home, including the basement, as well as in every sleeping room and outside each sleeping area.
• NFPA strongly recommends either installing combination smoke alarms, or both ionization and photoelectric alarms, in the home. An ionization alarm is typically more responsive to a flaming fire, such as a pan fire. A photoelectric alarm is typically more responsive to a smoldering fire, as might occur where a lighted cigarette is dropped on a sofa. Combination smoke alarms have ionization and photoelectric capabilities.
• Whatever type of smoke alarms you choose, they should carry the label of a recognized testing laboratory.
• Interconnected smoke alarms offer the best protection; when one sounds, they all do. This is particularly important in larger or multi-story homes, where the sound from distant smoke alarms may be reduced to the point that it may not be loud enough to provide proper warning, especially for sleeping individuals.
• A licensed electrician can install either hard-wired multiple-station alarms, or wireless alarms, which manufacturers have more recently begun producing. An electrician can also replace existing hard-wired smoke alarms with wireless interconnection capabilities.

Maintenance and Testing

• Test smoke alarms at least once a month using the test button, and make sure everyone in your home knows their sound.
• If an alarm “chirps,” warning the battery is low, replace the battery right away.
• Replace all smoke alarms, including alarms that use 10-year batteries and hard-wired alarms, when they’re 10 years old (or sooner) if they do not respond properly when tested.

"Reproduced from NFPA's Fire Prevention Week Web site, www.firepreventionweek.org. ©2010 NFPA."

Facts & figures

• In 2005, U.S. fire departments responded to 146,400 home structure fires that involved cooking equipment in 2005. These fires caused 480 civilian fire deaths, 4,690 civilian fire injuries and $876 million in direct property damage.
• Cooking equipment fires are the leading cause of home structure fires and associated civilian injuries. These fires accounted for 40% of all reported home structure fires in 2005 and 36% of home civilian injuries.
• Twelve percent of the fires occurred when something that could catch fire was too close to the equipment.
• Thanksgiving is the peak day for home cooking fires.