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Many people think fires only
happen to other people, and they are like you see on TV. Fires are
extremely nasty, to be trapped in a fire is your worst nightmare. Every
breath you take is full of burning acrid choking smoke. Your eyes sting and
stream with water. You cannot see, as smoke is very dense and black.
An increasing number of
deaths and injuries in the UK are caused as a direct result of batteries
being removed from nuisance smoke detectors.
Smoke alarms are the first
line of defence against fire in the home, but it is important to ensure the
correct type is chosen.
There are two different types
of smoke alarm: IONIZATION and OPTICAL.
Ionization smoke alarms are
very sensitive to cooking 'smoke', and if an ionization alarm is anywhere
near a cooker, it will probably give frequent false alarms. When this
happens, occupants often remove the battery which renders the alarm
inoperative. This is dangerous! To cure the problem simply
change the ionization alarm for an optical smoke alarm, which is not as
susceptible to this type of smoke.
Unfortunately, optical smoke
alarms are more expensive and are harder to find, most outlets only stock
the cheaper ionization type.
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