Taber Fire Department ready to help with your smoke detectors

Times Photo Submitted by Taber Fire Department

By Trevor Busch
Taber Times
editor@tabertimes.com

While it sometimes sounds like a tired refrain from fire prevention specialists, the importance of checking or replacing smoke alarms is vital and fundamental to ensuring your home and family are alerted to danger in the event of a fire.

The Taber Fire Department has a smoke alarm program in place, but many citizens may not be aware of it or how it works. And for Assistant Fire Chief Steve Swarbrick, smoke alarms are a serious business that help save lives.

“It’s an under-utilized program,” said Swarbrick. “I would like to have more awareness about it. On the calendar drive, I’m one of the slowest salesmen, because I end up talking to people more and asking them about their smoke alarms. And I was in some houses recently where there’s lots of misconceptions about smoke alarms. And as long as they’re there, they think they’re good, but very few people understand that they actually expire every 10 years and should be replaced. You need to have working smoke alarms in your home, and it’s just not part of the general public’s world – like they don’t have to understand it. So I’m hoping that this year we can (help them understand).”

This year’s Fire Prevention Week (Oct. 6-12) campaign theme is “Smoke Alarms: Make Them Work for You!” which is focused on educating people about the importance of having working smoke alarms in the home.

“Make them work for you, which I actually really appreciate, because just because they’re there doesn’t mean that they’re working,” said Swarbrick. “They need to be tested monthly at a minimum, make sure that they’ve got fresh batteries. Most alarms, newer alarms have a battery backup of some sort, so when you lose power, you still have battery or still have smoke alarms. Lots of people don’t understand that some of the older alarms do not have that battery backup. So you could have a power outage and have absolutely no smoke alarms in your home. So it’s important to contact the fire department. That’s part of what we do, and it doesn’t cost you anything because of the businesses and service groups that have sponsored it. At least we can come check it out, if nothing else, and make sure that they’re up to date. So I’d really like to see people be a little more aware about it. It’s easy for us when we talk about the kids programs in the schools that are receptive to us coming in and talking about it.”

During a Library Block Party held in 2024, one situation encountered by Swarbrick helps highlight the need for parents to be aware of the issues involving smoke alarms, not just their children.

“We just showed up with the truck and talked to lots of kids and showed them the truck and gave them a little bit of fire prevention information. And one of the mothers that brought their young boy up, I was talking to her about her smoke alarms, and she said, ‘Well, I think they’re good.’ And I said, ‘Well, we’ve got our program.’ Gave her my card. I said, ‘Just book an appointment sometime we can come check it out’. And she said, ‘Well, I live right there.’ It was just a few houses down. And I said, ‘Well, when you’re done, let’s take a walk, and we can come look at it right now if you want.’ So her little boy, he was done touring the trucks, and then she said, ‘Well, let’s go home. The fireman’s going to come and check our smoke alarms.’ He was just elated that we were coming to his house, because he wanted to show me his meeting place. That’s one of the things that I teach the kids, is they need to have a meeting place, that we know everybody’s out of the house or someone’s missing. And so he bounced all the way home, so excited to show me the meeting place, which was at the corner of his driveway, did an amazing job. I said, ‘That’s great.’ And then we go into the home and I check the smoke alarms, which were both battery operated upstairs and downstairs, neither alarm had any batteries in it, so they were actually just pieces of plastic hanging on the roof. So what I take away from that is we can be real good with the kids, and the kids buy in. And they are a little army that go out and talk to their families, but their families have an obligation because this kid has set up a meeting place and told his family about it, but no one’s going to know about the fire because the smoke alarms aren’t working. So that really highlighted to me that we do need the parents or the adults to pay attention, kind of like the kids do.”

Another incident in 2024 involved an actual call-out to a home and could have been significantly worse without a functioning smoke alarm.

“We did have one call this year that actually fits in with Fire Prevention Week. It was a big call for us. It was in the middle of the night, smoke alarm, or residential smoke alarm, went off and our duty officer arrived, could smell smoke. The house was dark, meaning people were probably in bed, there was a vehicle up front. (She) could smell smoke, audible alarms, and of course, she tried to raise awareness for the people in the house. No one was answering the door. The decision was made to actually breach the door, because there was obviously something going on inside. And as we were breaching the front door and consequently banging on the back door as well, the resident did answer the door, and the smoke was rolling out over their head. And the reason that I say that it works for this year’s Fire Prevention Week is that the alarm was a residential alarm that is monitored by a company, and had they not called us out, the alarm was not waking up that resident, and it could have had much more severe consequences. So thankfully, we were able to get around to the house and the resident out of the house and discovered it was a pot on fire, and were able to remove that pot. But it’s important to remember that smoke alarms do save lives.”

Swarbrick went on to explain how the Taber Fire Department’s smoke alarm program works in practice and how people can access it.

“So basically, it’s just booking an appointment with the fire department, 223-6010. We set up an appointment whenever we can come over to their home, come in and check the alarms, make sure that they’re current, make sure that the batteries are fresh, and that’s it. It doesn’t cost anything – there is a little bit of a complication where if it’s a combination alarm, smoke and carbon monoxide, we haven’t quite evolved the program to be able to cover that expense yet. So we only have smoke alarms, but we are more than willing to work with people and help understand that it’s overwhelming for them at the hardware store or wherever they go to buy the alarms. There’s so many – I’ve actually gone shopping with people and provide advice, ‘No, this is the one you need’ and have been able to help them that way. Doesn’t necessarily cover the cost, but at least can help them maintain that level of safety in their home.”

Carbon monoxide detectors are a good enhancement for any fire prevention methods currently employed in your home, and Swarbrick definitely recommends them in addition to smoke detectors.

“Absolutely 100 per cent, you need them on every floor. That’s a common misconception is that you only need them in the basement, which isn’t true, because if your hot water tank is producing carbon monoxide, and your furnace is drawing air it’s blowing that carbon monoxide throughout your house into the upper floors. So you do need to have carbon monoxide detectors on all floors.”

These devices also fail with age and use, so people need to be aware that carbon monoxide detectors aren’t bullet-proof.

“They’re a little different than the smoke alarms. They don’t have a standard set expiry, but I encourage people to use 10 years at a minimum. If they’re older than 10 years, replace them. But they kind of jump around. They go, five, seven, 12, they’re all over the place. But just a standard 10, unless you have the manufacturer’s information. Otherwise, it’s just best to use the 10 year.”

While not a necessary or required enhancement, Swarbrick talked about residential monitor alarms, a relatively new development in the world of fire prevention.

“Residential monitor alarms, so those are not part of our program. That’s a business that comes out, or multiple businesses, and they have those alarms as part of the security systems. They are a great enhancement to an alarm system, as the call alluded to earlier. Had that been just a regular residential alarm, like just a standard smoke alarm, that may not have a woke up the resident. It might not have woken her up, and then we wouldn’t have been called until someone noticed the fire, whereas that alarm specifically called out the fire department so that we could come and obviously help out.”

While an excellent enhancement, Swarbrick cautioned anyone who might believe they can replace their standard smoke alarms.

“So those residential alarms that are monitored are a great enhancement, but they’re not a replacement to the standard smoke alarms. That seems to happen more often than not, where people believe that those are good enough. A lot of them, without mentioning any systems directly, a lot of them will have options. You can pick your options, whether you have one upstairs, one downstairs, one in the living room, or whatever the option might be, but it’s options. But you actually need to maintain – however your house was built, you need to replace those alarms. So if it has one in the upstairs and one in the basement, you need to maintain those alarms. And that’s not part of our program, the additional residential monitored alarm. That’s an enhancement. They’re great, but they’re not a replacement, and that’s something that we help with with the program, because a lot of people think that’s all I need. Well, no, you still need the detector down in the basement. So we can help educate people.”

Swarbrick warned against people considering a new fire prevention device being touted in social media circles as the be-all, end-all of fire protection.

“We’re working on a public service announcement for what’s called a fire blanket. There’s been a high pressure presence on social media about fire blankets, and it’s touted as – I won’t say revolutionary – but as a consumer product that much safer, easier, cleaner and better to use than a standard fire extinguisher. They’re a great enhancement to a home. They are not a replacement for a fire extinguisher. We actually ordered a couple, and we’ve done some testing of them. And so that’s the video that we’re trying to make. It’s not to say not to buy them. What I’m hoping that people get from it is very clear that it’s not a replacement for a fire extinguisher. They work really good in certain situations. When you have a pot on the stove that’s on fire, they work great, but there’s alternatives to that. The lid for the pot does the same thing. A damp tea towel will do the same thing.”

Fire extinguishers and proper training are still the industry standard for dealing with various situations involving fire, says Swarbrick.

“They don’t cover the vast array that a fire extinguisher does. So if you take the time and you take a little bit of training on a portable fire extinguisher they will cover most fires in their incipient stage. That’s what they’re for. The fire blanket works really good for that pot that’s on the stove. But like I said, there’s alternatives, closing the oven door, keeping the oven door closed, turn the heat off, the fire will go away – it consumes oxygen. That’s the basis around the fire blankets. So not to say that you shouldn’t buy them, but they cannot replace portable fire extinguishers. A regular fire extinguisher should be in every home, and understand how to use it right. And the fire department’s always open to be able to give people a quick lesson. There’s training available for the portable fire extinguishers, but the social media presence that I’ve seen for fire blankets is a very aggressive sales approach to it. They do work in certain circumstances.”

“I don’t want to say not to buy them. I think that they do have a good value to them. But as I said, if you just take the time, there’s other things. The lid on the pot, that’s something we teach in our basic fire prevention lessons. If you’re cooking, you should have the lid for the pot that you’re cooking with. If you don’t have it, then get a different pot.”

Swarbrick says the local fire department is always there to help out when needed.

“The fire department is more than happy to help with home inspections or come and check out your smoke alarms as much as we can. We want to make our community safer and safer all the time, and we appreciate the community’s buy in to our programs and just making sure that you do contact the fire department, let us come over and have a look.”