Fire Prevention Open House
 
By Assistant Chief Keith Grierson
September 17, 2021
 

The Skippack Fire Company Fire Prevention Open House date and time have been set for: Thursday October 7th, from 6-8pm. Come visit us at the station: 1230 Bridge Road!

We will have many great things to see and learn about. We will have Skippack Emergency Medical Services, the Pennsylvania State Police, several of our mutual aid companies and much more.

Even though every week should be treated as "Fire Prevention" week, the 2021 Fire Prevention Week theme has been announced: The National Fire Protection Association® (NFPA), has announced “Learn the Sounds of Fire Safety™” as the theme for Fire Prevention Week, October 3-9. From beeps to chirps, this year’s campaign works to better educate the public about the sounds smoke alarms make, what those sounds mean, and how to respond to them.

According to the latest NFPA “Smoke Alarms in the U.S.” report, working smoke alarms in the home reduce the risk of dying in a reported fire by more than half. However, almost three out of five home fire deaths occur in homes with no smoke alarms (41 percent) or smoke alarms that failed to operate (16 percent); missing or non-functional power sources, including missing or disconnected batteries, dead batteries, and disconnected hardwired alarms or other AC power issues, are the most common factors when smoke alarms fail to operate.

Key messages for “Learn the Sounds of Fire Safety” include:

When a smoke alarm or carbon monoxide (CO) alarm sounds, respond immediately by exiting the home as quickly as possible.
If your alarm begins to chirp, it may mean that the batteries are running low and need to be replaced.

If the alarm continues to chirp after the batteries are replaced, or the alarm is more than 10 years old, it is time to replace the alarm.

Test all smoke and CO alarms monthly. Press the test button to make sure the alarm is working. (Put your system in test mode before testing if connected to an alarm company.)

If there is someone in your household who is deaf or hard of hearing, install bed shaker and strobe light alarms that will alert that person to a fire.

Check back here for more details on this years event.