Think You Are Safe With Your Smoke Detector-- Think Again



Three young children, 4-year-old twins and a 1-year-old girl, died during the fire as a result of inhaling toxic smoke, chemicals and carbon monoxide. The claim was brought against Walter Kidde and United Technologies Corporation, among others, as a result of an ionization smoke detector in the house failing to alarm. Unfortunately, most homeowners don’t know about the problem.

 Smoke detector manufacturers have known for more than 30 years that a standalone ionization smoke detector is not adequate to protect a home involving a slow-growth or slow-smoldering fire. Proper testing reveals that ionization smoke detectors do not even detect smoke. They detect submicron particles, which may not be produced in large enough quantity to activate an ionization.
Ionization detectors are also more dangerous because they give people a false sense of security. An ionization detector is often the detector that goes off when someone opens an oven door or burns toast. In such cases, there may be no visible smoke whatsoever. The sad truth is that folks who have these types of detectors assume that if their detector sounds in the absence of smoke, that it would certainly go off in a fire. That is a highly dangerous misconception

Another problem with the ionization design is that a person who has a battery operated detector may actually take the battery out to prevent nuisance alarms. The detector housings are made out of plastic so that when a fire does flame up and spread, the evidence is destroyed. The detector melts and burns. It may be impossible to determine the manufacturer of the detector or even whether there was a detector actually in the home.

There is an alternative technology available that makes the home much safer from smoldering fires. That’s the photoelectric design, which does sense the presence of smoke in a smoldering fire. This technology has been around for years and has proven to be effective.

So Please Take A Minute Now and Check Your Smoke Detector--Your Family's Safety Is Important!!