Carbon Monoxide and You
December 21, 2006
When we bought this house, I found it astonishing that it was recommended we get a smoke detector not just on every floor… but in every sleeping space. I really felt the pinch when I started remodeling and found out that, per the build code, all my smoke detectors had to be wired into the house’s wiring and interconnected. Well, I finally got them all wired up and I truly feel that it was worth the effort. We feel much more secure now that we have a smoke detector in almost every room.
But I always felt that installing carbon monoxide detectors were overkill. I mean - how many people have really died from CO poising?
Well, yesterday, it was almost my family.
Tonya called me at work and towards the end of our conversation, she mentioned she had a headache. She thought it was the front moving through ahead of the rain. I didn’t give it much thought. But then she said that Eli woke up and was acting like he had a headache. She thought it was the weather for him, too. But for some reason a vision of my hot water heater popped in my head. Then she said Clayton woke up nauseous and pale. That’s when I started to panic.
See, when the previous owner of our house had the hot water heater put in, whoever did it cut a corner and left the old vent hood in place. Newer water heaters already have a hood in place and don’t need an extra one. They just left it because it meant one less pipe to cut. I recall a contractor mentioning to me that I should ditch the extra hood to prevent exhaust from escaping into the basement. I put it on my “to do - sometime” list and forgot it.
Well, that hood would not leave my mind and I had Tonya dig up the carbon monoxide detector. Yep, we had one. It was one that plugged into the wall and kids never left it alone. So we put it on the shelf. She plugged it in and a few minutes later - it went off.
So they went shopping for a bit in the clean fresh air while I came home to figure out what was going on. I cranked up the hot water heater to get it going and held a mirror up to the exhaust hood. Sure enough - it got foggy immediately. My “to do” list got a quick shift.
My father-in-law, Jim, came over and helped me pull and replace the extra hood with a piece of pipe. It was a quick job and we saw an immediate result. The mirror didn’t fog up and we got good suction up the hood.
And we now have four carbon monoxide detectors throughout the house.
The moral of this story…
If you don’t have a carbon monoxide detector - get one! If you have one carbon monoxide detector - get another one! Don’t mess around with this. When I think about what I could have lost, it scares me to death.
December 21st, 2006 at 7:38 am
Paul, this story is terrifying. Thank God he gave you the presence of mind to think what might be causing your family to get sick.
December 21st, 2006 at 10:22 am
Wow, glad everything turned out OK! Guess what just went on my shopping list? We don’t have 100 years of out-of-date technology and homeowner modifications to worry about, but we do have modern laziness and cost-cutting measures!
By the way, thanks for sharing the story. It’s good that we all know just how real this danger is.
December 21st, 2006 at 10:44 am
Yea - I’m going to start hounding people now to make sure they get at least one carbon monoxide detector. Good to here you’re getting one. If we ever build, I’m going to wire up carbon monoxide detectors along side the smoke detectors in every room. I’m going to check, but I think you can get combo detectors.
One thing I’m unsure of is how CO disperses in the room. Is it better to have the detectors high or low in the room? I’ll have to research that…
December 21st, 2006 at 7:32 pm
That was a close one — thank heaven everyone is OK. We have a detector, and it has gone off before due to boiler problem (yes, boiler — some of us *do* have 100 year old technology). If your story isn’t enough to frighten your friends & family into action, you need look no further than the tragedy in St. Louis this past week: http://tinyurl.com/ybbp8c
December 21st, 2006 at 8:35 pm
Paul-
We were at Walmart tonight (buying CO detectors of course) and there is a sign there stating that on January 1st 2007 it’s a LAW that you have to have them. And yes, there are combination detectors that can be hard-wired with battery backup. Our house is wired with smoke detectors in every bedroom and downstairs but not CO. Hmm… now that I think of it, why didn’t I just get a combination unit to replace one of my regular smoke detectors…
December 21st, 2006 at 11:45 pm
Hopefully with CO detectors becoming law, the supply and demand will balance out and pull the price down. They’re awfully expensive. The cost was what kept us away from getting more than one. But now we don’t care about the cost… they cost less then our lives by several measures.
December 22nd, 2006 at 2:30 pm
Yep, so glad everyone was OK. Would have thought you would have had one. We have one in Blake’s room and upstairs in the hall by the other bedrooms. We had a leak right in the first years after we moved here. I hounded Sandy and Chris into getting one, the first night they had theirs it went off. A pipe with a hole in the basement. Ours our battery run. I change the smoke detectors batteries in the fall and the CO’s in the spring with the time change. The other thing every home should have is a weather alarm radio. I think such peace of mind when it storms. Ours only goes off for the counties I tell it. I actually rely on alerts for Henry and Stark counties more than Bureau as we are just in Bureau barely. Henry and Stark is where our weather generally comes from. Anyway look forward to seeing you. Love you all and take care of yourselves.