Halloween & Daylight Saving Time Fire Safety

According to the U.S. Fire Administration, there are 10,300 fires in the United States during the three-day period around Halloween. These fires cause about 25 deaths, 125 injuries and $83 million in property loss. Let’s stay safe this Halloween by following a few fire safety tips:

Choose a costume without long trailing fabric. This can cause a child to trip or may touch flames in jack-o’-lanterns or other decorations.

• If you make your own costume, use materials that won’t catch on fire easily if they come in contact with heat or flame.
• Give your children flashlights or glow sticks so they can see where they are walking.
• Keep decorations away from candles, light bulbs or heaters.
• Consider using flameless candles or glow sticks in your jack-o’-lantern.
• Keep exits clear of decorations.

Daylight Saving Time (DST) will end at exactly at 2:00 a.m. on Nov. 1, 2015. The mornings will get lighter and the evenings darker and we will get an extra hour in bed. When we change our clocks one hour back, we ask that our citizens also change the batteries in their smoke alarms and test the alarms by pushing the test button. Smoke alarms that are properly installed and maintained play a vital role in reducing fire deaths and injuries.

Smoke alarms save lives. If there is a fire in your home, smoke spreads fast and you need smoke alarms to give you time to get out. Having a working smoke alarm cuts the chances of dying in a reported fire in half. Almost two-thirds of home fire deaths resulted from fires in homes with no smoke alarms or no working smoke alarms.

Here's what you need to know!

• Install smoke alarms in every bedroom, outside each sleeping area and on every level of your home.
• Test your smoke alarms every month.
• When a smoke alarm sounds, get outside and stay outside.
• Replace all smoke alarms in your home every 10 years

More about staying safe with smoke alarms.

Smoke alarms by the numbers

• In 2007-2011, smoke alarms sounded in half of the home fires reported to U.S. fire departments.
• Three of every five home fire deaths resulted from fires in homes with no smoke alarms or no working smoke alarms.
• No smoke alarms were present in more than one-third (37%) of the home fire deaths.