Hey crew!  It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, but we’re back in the regular posting business now, and you can expect some great stuff coming down the pipe…starting today.  Let’s jump in.

This morning, I watched a presentation on home fires.  It wasn’t on selling home security systems, or fire systems, or anything like that.  It wasn’t even on fire prevention, which we’ve touched on in the past.  It was on one specific focus: What does it feel like to be in a fire?  What happens to you when you are in a fire?

The answers to those questions are shocking, and as the presenter pointed out, we definitely know more than most on fire safety and protection.  Which means, to you, the average (well, let’s be honest, you’re above-average, right?) person, the answers will knock you off your feet.

The presentation started with four main things you don’t know about fire, but absolutely must know if you want to survive a home fire.

1. Fire causes a room to be black…completely black.  In movies, you see people running through engulfed rooms, jumping over tables and chairs.  Reality is much, much scarier.  You will see nothing within a matter of minutes.  The room will be black, and you won’t be able to see clearly even a foot in front of your face.
2. The smoke and gases will kill you, not the flames.
3. The heat is completely unbearable.  It will knock you out, and kill you if you stand up.  And this level of heat can be achieved in a room with even a relatively small fire…and it only takes a few minutes.
4. The smell of smoke will not wake you up.  In fact, the gases present in the smoke will cause you to go into a deeper sleep.

Ok, so, let’s be honest: You didn’t know this.  You didn’t imagine that by the time you wake up (if it’s at night) during a fire, you will be essentially blind, completely disoriented from the smoke and gas, suffering under intense and sometimes deadly heat.  What you also didn’t know, partially because I didn’t fully tell you, is that you will only have a a matter of minutes to get out, about four or five, and that it will probably take a minute or so after the fire starts before the smoke detector sounds.

What does all of this mean?  In a fire, you will have almost no time to get out.  By the time you wake up, you will need to immediately grab your family and get out.  It’s not an exaggeration to say that every second counts in a house fire.

So, more to come on this, but starting thinking about how you can protect your family effectively from fire.  Do you have adequate coverage on smoke detectors?  Have you changed the batteries in your smoke detectors? Do you know exactly what you would do in the event of a house fire?  Does your family?  These may seem silly and dramatic questions, but at the end of the day, it could be the difference between life and death.