October 9-15, 2022 is Fire Prevention Week. This year’s theme is “Fire won’t wait. Plan your escape. ™. During this week, it is important to educate yourself and those around you about the actions that can be taken to stay safe from fires.
This year, Fire Prevention Week (FPW) is celebrating its 100th anniversary. Fire Prevention Week has been sponsored by the NFPA since 1922. In 1925, FPW was made a national observance by President Calvin Coolidge.
Every year, FPW is observed during the week of October 9th in commemoration of the Great Chicago Fire that killed more than 250 people, left 100,000 homeless and destroyed more than 17,400 structures.
“Fire won’t wait. Plan your escape. ™”
Did you know that home fires burn faster than ever before? During a home fire, you may have as little as 2 minutes to safely escape the fire after the smoke alarm goes off.
Safety depends on early warning from smoke alarm and advance planning. Plan and practice your home fire escape plan before a fire occurs. Make sure everyone in your household knows what to do. Children, older adults, and people with disabilities may need assistance to wake up and get out.
Create a Home Fire Escape Plan
If you don’t already have a fire escape plan for your home, take the time to make the plan with your family and those who live in your home. You should practice your home escape plan twice a year.
- Draw a map of all the rooms in your home.
- Mark two exits from each room (usually a door and a window). Mark a path from each exit to the outside.
- Include the location of all smoke alarms in your home.
- Choose an outside meeting place in front of your home where everyone will meet upon exiting.
- Add “911” or the local emergency number to your plan.
- Plan to call that number from a neighbor’s phone or a cell phone once you get outside.
Prepare Your Smoke Alarms
Your smoke alarms can sense smoke before you can. It is important to take care of your smoke alarms so that you can get the early warning that you need to safely escape. Mere seconds can be the difference between a fire escape and a fire tragedy.
Smoke alarms should be in every bedroom, outside of the sleeping areas (such as a hallway), and on each level (including the basement) of your home. Don’t put smoke alarms in kitchens and bathrooms. Choose an alarm that is listed with a testing laboratory, meaning it has met certain standards for protection.
Use combination smoke and carbon monoxide alarms that are interconnected throughout your home so that when one sounds, they all sound and everyone can hear them no matter where you are in the home.
To learn more helpful information about fire safety and Fire Prevention Week, check out the NFPA’s website.
