July 8, 2025 • 18 mins
It’s odorless, invisible, and a little misunderstood. In this episode we're busting some of the most common myths about carbon monoxide. Including why that outlet plug detector might be a waste of your moola.
We'll break down how CO poisoning actually works, where you should place your detectors, and how to avoid other sneaky everyday dangers, like blocked chimneys and indoor grilling disasters, to running generators during a blackout.
We're also sharing:
- Why you won't feel like you’re suffocating… until it’s too late
- What symptoms to watch for (and why it can look like the flu)
- How carbon monoxide affects pets (and why your cat might be the new canary)
- Why carbon monoxide is slightly lighter than air, and how that effects detector placement
- What to do immediately if the alarm goes off (hint: it’s not waving a kitchen towel at it)
This topic might not be flashy, but it’s personal. Admit it... we’ve all ignored a beeping alarm or assumed a detector was working just because it was there.
We’ve seen first hand what happens when people don’t know the signs, and how easy it is to prevent a tragedy with just a few simple changes. So in this episode we’re making it easy to understand, and throwing in a little humor - as always.
Whether you’re a renter with a mystery detector in the hallway or a homeowner trying to figure out what "turbulent air" means, this episode will give you some new insights.
Life Safety Associates specializes in emergency response training for corporate ERT Teams. We help businesses create competent and confident first responders who are ready to handle unexpected emergencies. For more information you find us @lifesafetyassoc or email@lifesafety.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jimmy (00:00):
What's happening?
Welcome to another life andsafety podcast with Jimmy and
your girl, megs.
Megan (00:07):
Hello.
Jimmy (00:08):
Today we're going to be talking about a little fire
safety per se, a little carbonmonoxide poisoning, and we're
going to talk about some myths,some stats and why it's
important to have a carbonmonoxide detector.
And with that I'm going to passthis over to Megs for some very
(00:29):
interesting stats.
Megan (00:33):
So carbon monoxide is I've heard it called the silent
killer, because oftentimes youdon't know that you have carbon
monoxide poisoning and then youjust feel sick, you have a
headache, you're nauseous, maybeyou think you have the flu, and
then you're dying, which is notgreat.
You want to avoid that.
So, according to the CDC, morethan 400 Americans die each year
(00:57):
from unintentional carbonmonoxide poisoning not linked to
fires.
Not linked to fires, more than100,000 visit the emergency room
each year and of those, morethan 14,000 are hospitalized
each year for carbon monoxidepoisoning.
So it's definitely a pretty bigissue, one that has a pretty
(01:17):
easy fix.
You know carbon monoxidedetectors.
Make sure that, if you havecarbon monoxide detectors, that
they are in fact detecting, thatthey're working, you know
they're not out of batteries,they're not covered in dust, and
make sure that they're placedcorrectly.
Which leads us into our myths.
Jimmy (01:41):
Yeah, actually I probably have passed some of these myths
on right.
So carbon monoxide, I thought,was heavier than air, so it
would sink.
And we did some research basedon the Sigma Aldrich SDS.
(02:03):
Base d on the Sigma Aldrich SDS, the vapor density of carbon
monoxide is 0.97, where air is 1.
So that means it's lighter thanair Ever so slightly Ever so
slightly, so it would justslightly float, and one of the
(02:28):
recommendations of installing acarbon monoxide is to put it I
think we saw one that was likefour feet from the top right.
Yeah, your ceiling on the wall.
So if it's a 10 foot ceiling,about five, six feet up yeah,
about five or six feet up.
You know that's good math.
Thank Thank you.
Four minus two is five or six.
Huh, I'm supposed to be the badmath person, megs.
Megan (02:50):
It is.
Take offense.
At least four feet away isbetween five and six feet.
Jimmy (02:58):
No, it's actually six.
Megan (03:00):
It's at least four feet away.
Jimmy (03:02):
Oh, here we go, well, the at least, huh, at least.
If it's exactly four feet away,that's at least four feet away.
Oh, here we go, well, the atleast, huh, at least.
Megan (03:06):
If it's exactly four feet away, that's at six feet, but
if you go at least so more thanfour feet.
Jimmy (03:11):
Here we go, here we go.
Hope you're all driving withyour boots on, because some
bullshit going on right now.
So so I actually and there aresome carbon monoxide detectors
(03:31):
that you plug into the wall andthat's in an outlet on the
ground, and that makes lots ofsense to me.
It did, and so we did someresearch this morning that if
it's ever in the air it would godown by the outlet.
Megan (03:42):
Yeah, as far as placement goes, the NFPA National Fire
Protection Association.
Nice recommends that you have acarbon monoxide alarm should be
centrally located outside ofeach separate sleeping area in
the immediate vicinity of thebedrooms.
(04:03):
Those are big words.
Basically, just make sure thatyou have a carbon monoxide alarm
near where you're sleeping.
It also recommends that if yourbedroom hallway is longer than
40 feet, you should have one ateach end of the hallway.
It's also suggested that youhave at least one alarm for each
(04:26):
floor.
So if you have a basement, onein the basement.
If you have a two-story house,at least one on each floor.
So if you have a basement, onein the basement.
If you have a two-story house,one at least one on each floor.
If possible.
It's good to have one in eachbedroom as well.
But when you're doing that,make sure that you're not
placing them inside garages,kitchens, furnace rooms or
anywhere extremely dusty ordirty or anywhere that's like
(04:48):
poorly insulated, like an addict, or a crawl space, because you
want to make sure that thecarbon monoxide alarm isn't
getting too cold or too hot.
If they're in like reallygreasy areas or fuel burning
areas within 20 feet of those,then they might go off at not a
(05:10):
time to be alarmed by.
Does that make sense?
Jimmy (05:14):
My words weren't great.
Megan (05:15):
All right, awesome.
Or extremely humid areas likebathrooms should be at least 10
feet away from the bath, or ashower or sauna humidifier, et
cetera, et cetera, just becausewater can also mess with the
sensors.
And then don't place them rightnear quote turbulent air meaning
like ceiling fans, airconditioners, vents, things like
(05:37):
that, or open windows orwindows that you have open often
because blowing air can preventthe detector from detecting the
carbon monoxide because it'sflowing, the air is flowing and
keeping it from landing on thesensor in a way that sets off
the alarm.
So what causes carbon monoxidepoisoning?
(06:00):
Basically, the science behindit is that carbon monoxide is.
It bonds to the hemoglobin inyour blood and it bonds a lot
better than the oxygen.
So, even though you have oxygenin your system, the carbon
dioxide monoxide, not dioxide oh, we had that issue earlier.
(06:21):
Carbon monoxide bonds to thehemoglobin in your blood a lot
better than the oxygen and itjust takes that spot.
And so you basically suffocatefrom the inside out, even though
you have oxygen in your systemor around you.
It's just that your blood likesthe carbon monoxide a lot
better and you just don't getoxygen into your system in the
(06:43):
way that you need it right.
Jimmy (06:45):
So that should take us to what are some signs and
symptoms of carbon monoxidepoisoning like what you
mentioned?
You know that people would kindof feel like they were sick,
the flu or something like that.
But what are some more specificthings other than the flu-like
symptoms, which?
Megan (07:03):
is everything which is everything right headaches are a
big one Dizziness, nausea, youknow, confusion, fainting things
like that.
A lot of times you don'tnecessarily feel like you don't
have oxygen.
(07:24):
My understanding is you don'tfeel like you're suffocating
because your body, thehemoglobin, is still acting on a
molecule.
It's just the wrong molecule,so the alarm systems that are in
your body don't necessarily gooff and don't necessarily or not
like oh, I feel like I'msuffocating.
What?
I knocked the table, I shiftedmy leg and I kicked the table.
(07:47):
I'm sorry that was me.
No, you're.
Jimmy (07:48):
That was me.
No, you're good, it juststartled me.
Megan (07:53):
But yeah, so you feel sick, but you don't necessarily
feel like you're suffocating.
Jimmy (07:59):
Good.
So the headache let's talkabout the headache.
So it does start off as a dullheadache.
You're in the base of your neckand then it gets to be really
painful, like migraine typeheadache towards the front of
your head.
Megan (08:14):
Exciting.
Jimmy (08:14):
Yeah, so it's pretty awesome, right, if the person's
suffocating.
But they don't know they'resuffocating, they just feel achy
and gross To your point.
What are some other things thatcause carbon monoxide poisoning
?
So obviously a house fire,right, or leaking appliance,
maybe things like that.
So now, like, the house fire isnot really going to give you
(08:37):
carbon monoxide poisoning, it'sprobably the pre, it's the
precursor to a fire, and theheavy smoke and stuff like that
from the fires what usuallykills you, right?
Um, but how does one get carbonmonoxide other than that?
Megan (08:53):
um, a big one is, uh, in the garage, like if you have
your car running and you haveyour garage door shut and your
car is inside the garage.
I feel like that's implied, butI should clarify sure um things
like that yeah, yeah.
Jimmy (09:10):
Yeah, I think that's a little harder to do nowadays, I
think, with the cars, becausethey're so low emission, but it
definitely can happen.
So don't just be like, oh, Ihave a low emission car, I have
a newer car, it's going to beokay.
Nah, it can still happen.
Growing up, that was always abig thing.
Growing up, that was always abig thing.
You know.
Most of you know.
I grew up in the mountains andpeople were always like if you
(09:33):
get stuck in the cold in yourcar, you know, don't fall asleep
with your heater on your car on, because it would suck the
carbon monoxide from yourexhaust and stuff in your car
and it's not going to keep youwarm.
It will keep you warm, but itcould potentially kill you too.
So that was a thing and Iremember at a ski resort that
happening to two people.
(09:54):
They were sleeping in their carat the ski resort trying to get
fresh tracks, I guess.
Or first tracks First and freshtracks, and they ended up dying
because of the heater on theircar and then people being stuck
(10:14):
on the road happens.
Megan (10:16):
That makes sense.
Yeah, grills are another big oneso hopefully you're grilling
outside in a well ventilatedlocation, um, but in emt school
my teacher talked about a storythat he responded to.
A family it was was you knowdead of winter, freezing cold.
Their heating went out so theybrought their grill inside, um,
(10:37):
as a sort of you know littlespace heater.
Um, and they didn't processthat that was going to be a
problem and they started feelingreally sick.
So they called 911.
Cause they're like I don't knowwhat's happening.
We're all like throwing up andour head hurts and we feel
really sick and we don't knowwhy.
And then, uh, was in factcarbon monoxide poisoning, um.
(11:00):
Another one is generators,especially like a?
Um.
Don't know where I was goingwith that, but generators, even
if you think that you prop opena window and so it's ventilated,
not enough.
Don't be running a grill or agenerator or none of that inside
(11:20):
in locations, because you'regoing to die.
Jimmy (11:24):
Yeah.
So what about if we had, whenwe have our big earthquake and I
wanted to power my house withmy generator?
Mm-hmm, so keep that generatoroutside and run a really long
extension cord.
Megan (11:38):
Yeah.
Jimmy (11:39):
Right, versus having it in the house or even in the
garage, mm-hmm, because if youopen up the garage, you can
potentially start a fire becauseit is highly flammable.
Carbon monoxide is right, so wedefinitely want to be careful
of that.
Megan (12:00):
Another one is like blocked vents.
So if you're going to be doingany remodeling in your house,
make sure that you're followingsafety codes and stuff and not
accidentally blocking a flu oranything like that.
If you're going to be having aum like if you have a fireplace
in your living room and youactually yeah, it's one of the
(12:20):
very few clean air days whereyou can or not clean air days.
Words are hard one of the daysthat you could actually burn,
burn wood in your uh fireplaceat your house to make sure that
you know you're venting itproperly and you have your
chimney open.
And all of that Making goodchoices, good choices.
Jimmy (12:39):
Yes, it is definitely.
We have a fireplace in ourhouse.
I think we're lucky we don'tget to burn it as much as I'd
like to because of the clean airdays, things like that, and the
family people in my family justdon't do well with the smoke in
(13:02):
the house and stuff like that.
And if you do have one, one ofthe things that we looked at was
getting our chimney cleaned.
Have one, one of the thingsthat we looked at was getting
our chimney cleaned.
So then we don't, you know,because if you the chimney build
up with a carbon and all thatkind of stuff in there, it can
produce carbon monoxide also andthat could actually start more
fires and, um, it can actuallyleak.
(13:23):
Oh interesting, you know thecarbon monoxide things like that
around the fireplaces and intoyour attics and things like that
.
So you, you got to be reallycareful with those, get them
clean, get them taken care of.
So you brought that up.
So I felt like that was areally good kind of a good idea
to bring that in there.
Megan (13:39):
Yeah, for sure.
Jimmy (13:41):
So if you have a you know chimney, make sure you get it
cleaned.
There's a really cool familybusiness actually called Chimney
Clean here in the Bay Area andthey've come out and taken care
of our you know their service toours.
I think they've cleaned ourchimney twice and I think we've
(14:05):
had maybe one fire in the lastfive years, but they still, you
know, still call us andeverything else.
They're really cool folks, nice.
So something to think about.
Megan (14:18):
Let's talk about what to do if your alarm goes off.
Well, first of all, don'tignore it.
I won't say that I'm not guiltyof my fire alarm going off while
cooking something and perhapsdoing not cooking great, and I
(14:40):
just, you know, open the backdoor and fan the smoke alarm
with my tea towel.
Don't do that for carbonmonoxide detectors.
Get outside fresh air.
Carbon monoxide detectors Getoutside.
Fresh air.
Fresh air is the only thingthat's going to help get you out
of that poisoning.
You got to get oxygen into yoursystem.
So don't you know?
Wait, think, oh, it's probablya false alarm.
(15:03):
Even if it's a false alarm,it's not worth the risk.
Get outside, call 911.
And don't go back inside untilprofessionals check it out and
make sure that there's you know,not a leak.
And if there is a leak, don'tgo back inside until the leak is
fixed good, good, excellent.
Jimmy (15:25):
Actually a good piece of advice there.
Um, in our building evacuationclasses we always tell people it
may not be a false alarm, youknow, so go off and then, with
that being said, check yourbatteries.
Megan (15:40):
Oh yeah.
Jimmy (15:41):
Check your batteries in your alarm right.
The good rule of thumb isalways, every time the time
changes, change your batteriesMm-hmm Right and even if they're
like pre-wired so we actuallywired our last set of smoke
detectors and carbon monoxidedetectors the filament inside
(16:05):
there they still expire, sothere's still an expiration date
on there that you have to lookat.
Megan (16:11):
Interesting.
Jimmy (16:13):
So something to think about.
Actually, when you, when wasthe last time you moved, when
you started working for us,didn't you?
Weren't you having an issuewith your fire alarm?
Yeah, smoke detector, mm-hmm,yeah, and wasn't it because it
was expired?
Yeah, all right, yeah, so Idon't remember how.
I remember that that was yearsago.
Megan (16:38):
And I just remember that right now, for some reason, trap
folks Still a trap.
I think you had one more pointright, not necessarily a great
point, but something that I findinteresting.
Have you ever heard the phrasethe canary in a coal mine?
It's about when coal minerswere down in the coals.
Carbon monoxide levels couldbuild up down there and would
(17:00):
cause, you know, illnesses anddeath, and so they would
actually bring canaries, thelittle birds, down into the coal
mines and the canaries wouldfeel the effects quicker and
they would pass out or die, andthat would be a warning system
for the human coal mine to belike, oh hey, something's wrong,
we got to get out of here.
(17:21):
they would get up and get freshair and know that there was, um,
probably a carbon monoxide leakdown there.
So, um, a little tip is uh,pets can absolutely get carbon
monoxide poisoning, so they canshow symptoms and also be sick.
And so you know, keep an eye onyour pets, and if you have pets
(17:42):
and your carbon monoxide alarmgoes off, also get them out of
the house.
Jimmy (17:49):
Yes, All right team.
Thanks for joining us today onthe Life and Safety Podcast.
No-transcript.
What's happening?
Welcome to another life andsafety podcast with Jimmy and
your girl, megs.
Megan (00:07):
Hello.
Jimmy (00:08):
Today we're going to be talking about a little fire
safety per se, a little carbonmonoxide poisoning, and we're
going to talk about some myths,some stats and why it's
important to have a carbonmonoxide detector.
And with that I'm going to passthis over to Megs for some very
(00:29):
interesting stats.
Megan (00:33):
So carbon monoxide is I've heard it called the silent
killer, because oftentimes youdon't know that you have carbon
monoxide poisoning and then youjust feel sick, you have a
headache, you're nauseous, maybeyou think you have the flu, and
then you're dying, which is notgreat.
You want to avoid that.
So, according to the CDC, morethan 400 Americans die each year
(00:57):
from unintentional carbonmonoxide poisoning not linked to
fires.
Not linked to fires, more than100,000 visit the emergency room
each year and of those, morethan 14,000 are hospitalized
each year for carbon monoxidepoisoning.
So it's definitely a pretty bigissue, one that has a pretty
(01:17):
easy fix.
You know carbon monoxidedetectors.
Make sure that, if you havecarbon monoxide detectors, that
they are in fact detecting, thatthey're working, you know
they're not out of batteries,they're not covered in dust, and
make sure that they're placedcorrectly.
Which leads us into our myths.
Jimmy (01:41):
Yeah, actually I probably have passed some of these myths
on right.
So carbon monoxide, I thought,was heavier than air, so it
would sink.
And we did some research basedon the Sigma Aldrich SDS.
(02:03):
Base d on the Sigma Aldrich SDS, the vapor density of carbon
monoxide is 0.97, where air is 1.
So that means it's lighter thanair Ever so slightly Ever so
slightly, so it would justslightly float, and one of the
(02:28):
recommendations of installing acarbon monoxide is to put it I
think we saw one that was likefour feet from the top right.
Yeah, your ceiling on the wall.
So if it's a 10 foot ceiling,about five, six feet up yeah,
about five or six feet up.
You know that's good math.
Thank Thank you.
Four minus two is five or six.
Huh, I'm supposed to be the badmath person, megs.
Megan (02:50):
It is.
Take offense.
At least four feet away isbetween five and six feet.
Jimmy (02:58):
No, it's actually six.
Megan (03:00):
It's at least four feet away.
Jimmy (03:02):
Oh, here we go, well, the at least, huh, at least.
If it's exactly four feet away,that's at least four feet away.
Oh, here we go, well, the atleast, huh, at least.
Megan (03:06):
If it's exactly four feet away, that's at six feet, but
if you go at least so more thanfour feet.
Jimmy (03:11):
Here we go, here we go.
Hope you're all driving withyour boots on, because some
bullshit going on right now.
So so I actually and there aresome carbon monoxide detectors
(03:31):
that you plug into the wall andthat's in an outlet on the
ground, and that makes lots ofsense to me.
It did, and so we did someresearch this morning that if
it's ever in the air it would godown by the outlet.
Megan (03:42):
Yeah, as far as placement goes, the NFPA National Fire
Protection Association.
Nice recommends that you have acarbon monoxide alarm should be
centrally located outside ofeach separate sleeping area in
the immediate vicinity of thebedrooms.
(04:03):
Those are big words.
Basically, just make sure thatyou have a carbon monoxide alarm
near where you're sleeping.
It also recommends that if yourbedroom hallway is longer than
40 feet, you should have one ateach end of the hallway.
It's also suggested that youhave at least one alarm for each
(04:26):
floor.
So if you have a basement, onein the basement.
If you have a two-story house,at least one on each floor.
So if you have a basement, onein the basement.
If you have a two-story house,one at least one on each floor.
If possible.
It's good to have one in eachbedroom as well.
But when you're doing that,make sure that you're not
placing them inside garages,kitchens, furnace rooms or
anywhere extremely dusty ordirty or anywhere that's like
(04:48):
poorly insulated, like an addict, or a crawl space, because you
want to make sure that thecarbon monoxide alarm isn't
getting too cold or too hot.
If they're in like reallygreasy areas or fuel burning
areas within 20 feet of those,then they might go off at not a
(05:10):
time to be alarmed by.
Does that make sense?
Jimmy (05:14):
My words weren't great.
Megan (05:15):
All right, awesome.
Or extremely humid areas likebathrooms should be at least 10
feet away from the bath, or ashower or sauna humidifier, et
cetera, et cetera, just becausewater can also mess with the
sensors.
And then don't place them rightnear quote turbulent air meaning
like ceiling fans, airconditioners, vents, things like
(05:37):
that, or open windows orwindows that you have open often
because blowing air can preventthe detector from detecting the
carbon monoxide because it'sflowing, the air is flowing and
keeping it from landing on thesensor in a way that sets off
the alarm.
So what causes carbon monoxidepoisoning?
(06:00):
Basically, the science behindit is that carbon monoxide is.
It bonds to the hemoglobin inyour blood and it bonds a lot
better than the oxygen.
So, even though you have oxygenin your system, the carbon
dioxide monoxide, not dioxide oh, we had that issue earlier.
(06:21):
Carbon monoxide bonds to thehemoglobin in your blood a lot
better than the oxygen and itjust takes that spot.
And so you basically suffocatefrom the inside out, even though
you have oxygen in your systemor around you.
It's just that your blood likesthe carbon monoxide a lot
better and you just don't getoxygen into your system in the
(06:43):
way that you need it right.
Jimmy (06:45):
So that should take us to what are some signs and
symptoms of carbon monoxidepoisoning like what you
mentioned?
You know that people would kindof feel like they were sick,
the flu or something like that.
But what are some more specificthings other than the flu-like
symptoms, which?
Megan (07:03):
is everything which is everything right headaches are a
big one Dizziness, nausea, youknow, confusion, fainting things
like that.
A lot of times you don'tnecessarily feel like you don't
have oxygen.
(07:24):
My understanding is you don'tfeel like you're suffocating
because your body, thehemoglobin, is still acting on a
molecule.
It's just the wrong molecule,so the alarm systems that are in
your body don't necessarily gooff and don't necessarily or not
like oh, I feel like I'msuffocating.
What?
I knocked the table, I shiftedmy leg and I kicked the table.
(07:47):
I'm sorry that was me.
No, you're.
Jimmy (07:48):
That was me.
No, you're good, it juststartled me.
Megan (07:53):
But yeah, so you feel sick, but you don't necessarily
feel like you're suffocating.
Jimmy (07:59):
Good.
So the headache let's talkabout the headache.
So it does start off as a dullheadache.
You're in the base of your neckand then it gets to be really
painful, like migraine typeheadache towards the front of
your head.
Megan (08:14):
Exciting.
Jimmy (08:14):
Yeah, so it's pretty awesome, right, if the person's
suffocating.
But they don't know they'resuffocating, they just feel achy
and gross To your point.
What are some other things thatcause carbon monoxide poisoning
?
So obviously a house fire,right, or leaking appliance,
maybe things like that.
So now, like, the house fire isnot really going to give you
(08:37):
carbon monoxide poisoning, it'sprobably the pre, it's the
precursor to a fire, and theheavy smoke and stuff like that
from the fires what usuallykills you, right?
Um, but how does one get carbonmonoxide other than that?
Megan (08:53):
um, a big one is, uh, in the garage, like if you have
your car running and you haveyour garage door shut and your
car is inside the garage.
I feel like that's implied, butI should clarify sure um things
like that yeah, yeah.
Jimmy (09:10):
Yeah, I think that's a little harder to do nowadays, I
think, with the cars, becausethey're so low emission, but it
definitely can happen.
So don't just be like, oh, Ihave a low emission car, I have
a newer car, it's going to beokay.
Nah, it can still happen.
Growing up, that was always abig thing.
Growing up, that was always abig thing.
You know.
Most of you know.
I grew up in the mountains andpeople were always like if you
(09:33):
get stuck in the cold in yourcar, you know, don't fall asleep
with your heater on your car on, because it would suck the
carbon monoxide from yourexhaust and stuff in your car
and it's not going to keep youwarm.
It will keep you warm, but itcould potentially kill you too.
So that was a thing and Iremember at a ski resort that
happening to two people.
(09:54):
They were sleeping in their carat the ski resort trying to get
fresh tracks, I guess.
Or first tracks First and freshtracks, and they ended up dying
because of the heater on theircar and then people being stuck
(10:14):
on the road happens.
Megan (10:16):
That makes sense.
Yeah, grills are another big oneso hopefully you're grilling
outside in a well ventilatedlocation, um, but in emt school
my teacher talked about a storythat he responded to.
A family it was was you knowdead of winter, freezing cold.
Their heating went out so theybrought their grill inside, um,
(10:37):
as a sort of you know littlespace heater.
Um, and they didn't processthat that was going to be a
problem and they started feelingreally sick.
So they called 911.
Cause they're like I don't knowwhat's happening.
We're all like throwing up andour head hurts and we feel
really sick and we don't knowwhy.
And then, uh, was in factcarbon monoxide poisoning, um.
(11:00):
Another one is generators,especially like a?
Um.
Don't know where I was goingwith that, but generators, even
if you think that you prop opena window and so it's ventilated,
not enough.
Don't be running a grill or agenerator or none of that inside
(11:20):
in locations, because you'regoing to die.
Jimmy (11:24):
Yeah.
So what about if we had, whenwe have our big earthquake and I
wanted to power my house withmy generator?
Mm-hmm, so keep that generatoroutside and run a really long
extension cord.
Megan (11:38):
Yeah.
Jimmy (11:39):
Right, versus having it in the house or even in the
garage, mm-hmm, because if youopen up the garage, you can
potentially start a fire becauseit is highly flammable.
Carbon monoxide is right, so wedefinitely want to be careful
of that.
Megan (12:00):
Another one is like blocked vents.
So if you're going to be doingany remodeling in your house,
make sure that you're followingsafety codes and stuff and not
accidentally blocking a flu oranything like that.
If you're going to be having aum like if you have a fireplace
in your living room and youactually yeah, it's one of the
(12:20):
very few clean air days whereyou can or not clean air days.
Words are hard one of the daysthat you could actually burn,
burn wood in your uh fireplaceat your house to make sure that
you know you're venting itproperly and you have your
chimney open.
And all of that Making goodchoices, good choices.
Jimmy (12:39):
Yes, it is definitely.
We have a fireplace in ourhouse.
I think we're lucky we don'tget to burn it as much as I'd
like to because of the clean airdays, things like that, and the
family people in my family justdon't do well with the smoke in
(13:02):
the house and stuff like that.
And if you do have one, one ofthe things that we looked at was
getting our chimney cleaned.
Have one, one of the thingsthat we looked at was getting
our chimney cleaned.
So then we don't, you know,because if you the chimney build
up with a carbon and all thatkind of stuff in there, it can
produce carbon monoxide also andthat could actually start more
fires and, um, it can actuallyleak.
(13:23):
Oh interesting, you know thecarbon monoxide things like that
around the fireplaces and intoyour attics and things like that
.
So you, you got to be reallycareful with those, get them
clean, get them taken care of.
So you brought that up.
So I felt like that was areally good kind of a good idea
to bring that in there.
Megan (13:39):
Yeah, for sure.
Jimmy (13:41):
So if you have a you know chimney, make sure you get it
cleaned.
There's a really cool familybusiness actually called Chimney
Clean here in the Bay Area andthey've come out and taken care
of our you know their service toours.
I think they've cleaned ourchimney twice and I think we've
(14:05):
had maybe one fire in the lastfive years, but they still, you
know, still call us andeverything else.
They're really cool folks, nice.
So something to think about.
Megan (14:18):
Let's talk about what to do if your alarm goes off.
Well, first of all, don'tignore it.
I won't say that I'm not guiltyof my fire alarm going off while
cooking something and perhapsdoing not cooking great, and I
(14:40):
just, you know, open the backdoor and fan the smoke alarm
with my tea towel.
Don't do that for carbonmonoxide detectors.
Get outside fresh air.
Carbon monoxide detectors Getoutside.
Fresh air.
Fresh air is the only thingthat's going to help get you out
of that poisoning.
You got to get oxygen into yoursystem.
So don't you know?
Wait, think, oh, it's probablya false alarm.
(15:03):
Even if it's a false alarm,it's not worth the risk.
Get outside, call 911.
And don't go back inside untilprofessionals check it out and
make sure that there's you know,not a leak.
And if there is a leak, don'tgo back inside until the leak is
fixed good, good, excellent.
Jimmy (15:25):
Actually a good piece of advice there.
Um, in our building evacuationclasses we always tell people it
may not be a false alarm, youknow, so go off and then, with
that being said, check yourbatteries.
Megan (15:40):
Oh yeah.
Jimmy (15:41):
Check your batteries in your alarm right.
The good rule of thumb isalways, every time the time
changes, change your batteriesMm-hmm Right and even if they're
like pre-wired so we actuallywired our last set of smoke
detectors and carbon monoxidedetectors the filament inside
(16:05):
there they still expire, sothere's still an expiration date
on there that you have to lookat.
Megan (16:11):
Interesting.
Jimmy (16:13):
So something to think about.
Actually, when you, when wasthe last time you moved, when
you started working for us,didn't you?
Weren't you having an issuewith your fire alarm?
Yeah, smoke detector, mm-hmm,yeah, and wasn't it because it
was expired?
Yeah, all right, yeah, so Idon't remember how.
I remember that that was yearsago.
Megan (16:38):
And I just remember that right now, for some reason, trap
folks Still a trap.
I think you had one more pointright, not necessarily a great
point, but something that I findinteresting.
Have you ever heard the phrasethe canary in a coal mine?
It's about when coal minerswere down in the coals.
Carbon monoxide levels couldbuild up down there and would
(17:00):
cause, you know, illnesses anddeath, and so they would
actually bring canaries, thelittle birds, down into the coal
mines and the canaries wouldfeel the effects quicker and
they would pass out or die, andthat would be a warning system
for the human coal mine to belike, oh hey, something's wrong,
we got to get out of here.
(17:21):
they would get up and get freshair and know that there was, um,
probably a carbon monoxide leakdown there.
So, um, a little tip is uh,pets can absolutely get carbon
monoxide poisoning, so they canshow symptoms and also be sick.
And so you know, keep an eye onyour pets, and if you have pets
(17:42):
and your carbon monoxide alarmgoes off, also get them out of
the house.
Jimmy (17:49):
Yes, All right team.
Thanks for joining us today onthe Life and Safety Podcast.
No-transcript.
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