Fire Prevention Week
Posted Oct 6, 2010 03:49:54 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Smoke alarms and escape plans. Those are the messages being preached by fire services to mark Fire Prevention Week 2010.
Kitchener fire chief Tim Beckett tells 570’s Gary Doyle Show “The Great Canadian Fire Drill” is the focus this year.
“Not only draft it out and know where to go, but practice it,” Beckett urges. “Because when the fire does happen, you’re not going to have that time to sit there and remember, ‘where do I go, what do I do?”
The problem, according to Beckett, is that we often become complacent with the “it won’t happen to me” philosophy. But stats show that fires claim an average of 8 lives in Canada every week, and almost three out of four of those fires are residential.
“We’ve got to be more proactive and more conscious of things around us,” Beckett states. “And we’ve got to make sure we’re doing the right things to protect our families and our homes.”
In Ontario, it’s the law for all Ontario homes to have a working smoke alarm on every storey and outside all sleeping areas.
Beckett says equipping our home with smoke alarms, and changing the batteries twice a year, is something we simply can’t afford not to do.
“I think it’s the thing that you have to do to protect your family,” Beckett insists. “I don’t think you can put a dollar figure on what your family is worth. Smoke alarms are $10, $12, $15 at your local store.”
Fire Prevention Week runs through October 9th.
