That Time We Talked About Fire Safety

This is episode number 24 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We are so glad that you took the time to join us today on this special episode of The Homeowners Show.

I think they're all special.

They are special?

Yeah, you say special a lot.

I say special a lot?

Yeah, so every one of these are special to all you listeners.

Super special, fantastical, fragilisticexpialidocious.

Yeah, I like the Disney reference.

Show we got for you today. Um, it's just Kevin and I here in the roasty toasty Homeowners Show studios. How you doing, Kev?

Man, I'm doing well. It feels good in here.

You already have that little dart about my vernacular, but—

Oh well, you'll get over it.

No, I won't. Yeah, you will.

Other than that, man, I'm doing good. It's, uh, it's been a busy week, but sometimes that's good. And, uh, I'm glad to be here talking about what we got going on today. How about you, man?

I, man, think things are going really, really well. I mean, busy keeps me out of trouble, and I've been really busy. Okay. Um, but never too busy to jump on here and talk about One of my favorite subjects, owning a home.

Owning a home, man, it's a good thing.

It is the bee's knees.

Well, maybe, but it is a good thing.

You got something against bees?

No, I don't have anything against them or their knees.

So do you even know if they have knees?

I don't think they do.

You don't think they do?

No. Okay.

Do you think someone needs to FAQ Kevin on this? Uh, Snopes, if you could get on.

Uh, yeah, please go with Snopes.

Kevin needs his own page on Snopes. Snopes has never been discredited. He's made some outlandish remarks and comments about bees, and he needs to be taken to task about it.

There's a whole episode about bees.

Yeah, well, we'll bring Julie back in and let her give you a good finger wagging.

Oh man.

Whether you're right or wrong, you've got it coming.

Yeah, that's true. So we—

to me, this is actually a really important episode, and we've, we've, we've really never kind of gone down this road on the show before, but I, I feel like it's an important important one. And I think it's something that's going to be valuable to our listeners. Occasionally, we're going to jump in on some home safety issues.

Yeah.

And we may occasionally bring in a guest on this one, but this one, we just kind of felt like, not that there's not any good experts out here, but that we could handle it. We could do a little bit of research and just talk to our listeners about fire safety. And I'm thinking probably in August, we're going to probably do like a hurricane and an emergency evacuation episode, like things that you can have to get ready. get out of your home and things that you can be prepared to do. I've even got some crazy stories about some hurricane evacuations that I've had to deal with. But today, we're going to be talking about fire.

Yeah!

Fire in the house. And in the course of doing some research for this episode, I mean, there were some really interesting things that I didn't know and some surprising things that I found out about fire.

Yeah! It's really one of those things that I think a lot of us just take for granted that it's probably not going to happen.

Yeah.

Um, but you know, we, we, uh, shortly before we moved into the house we're in, the, the neighbor across the street, they'd been there for a long time, their house burned to the ground.

Yeah.

And, and it happened from a lamp. And, uh, she, um, wife was sitting reading one evening ran into her bedroom, um, to do something, came back out, lamp was on fire, like, like big flames. And, um, they got out and the whole house was burned to the ground because of it.

Oh my gosh, like it actually caught the whole house on fire?

Yeah, yeah, they had to rebuild from the ground up.

Good grief.

Yeah, so, you know, it's one of those things that you may think it will never happen, but it doesn't mean that you shouldn't be prepared in case something happens.

Right. I mean, and, you know, obviously we, we have great emergency services and guys and gals that, that work in those areas that do just an absolutely incredible job. Um, but, you know, without communication and, um, you know, just preparedness, those guys have a very small window to come in and address those kinds of things. Uh, and I think I mentioned last episode when we were talking, uh, to Burke Family Plumbing about fire hydrants, about my, my experience with the fire department, because our property caught on fire a couple years back. Um, and that was, that was particularly scary for me, uh, just because I got a phone call from a neighbor saying, hey, your place is

on fire.

Wow.

And I was, I was about 45 minutes away. I didn't know if anybody was even home. Um, and at the time we had a little baby, and so we were, you know, it was, it was not unusual to have somebody like asleep in the house during the day. Um, and I, I immediately went into panic mode of, you know, trying to make phone calls, see who's at the— see who's at the house. Is there anybody in the property? And then we had animals on the property as well that we were concerned about.

Yeah.

Um, and so I, you know, I was 45 minutes away. I think I made it home in about 25 minutes and didn't get caught doing that. And immediately, you know, jumped on the four-wheeler and started, you know, looking for all the animals and, and different things like that. So, but what was incredible about it is by the time I got here, uh, there was, you know, 4 or 5 vehicles on the property from the fire department. They'd already begun to put it out.

Yeah.

Um, but it was incredible to me how quickly the fire spread. Um, and once, once I got home, I knew— I, I mean, I'm not a fire expert, but I could figure out real easy where it started.

Yeah.

Um, and like, it burned trees Within minutes. It was insane.

Yeah, yeah, when, when they get hot enough, it doesn't take long.

No. Um, and, and you would— I mean, and if, you know, if you'd ever been out on my property, it, it, it's incredible to even think that from where it started and how far it spread so quickly.

Wow.

Um, so yeah, they can, they can be extremely scary situations, man.

Um, yeah, and you also have to think that If, if a fire occurs and the fire department has to come and start putting a fire out, there's a lot of damage to your home being done by the removal of a fire.

Yeah, absolutely.

Extinguishing of that fire. So, you know, that's really why we wanted to talk to you guys about this, uh, today is we think that there are some things, some, some checklist items, uh, that you need to be aware of that you can do, you can check, do some regular checking on to hopefully prevent a fire from happening. And if you can do some preventative measures on the front end of it, maybe you never have to deal with, even if it's a small fire, having to worry about the damage that is required to extinguish it.

Yeah. And for Kevin and I, this was a subject that was kind of top of mind, tip of tongue. I mean, we have an acquaintance whose daughter recently accidentally caught her herself on fire in the kitchen.

Yeah.

And I mean, we don't know all the details because I mean, these things are personal and tragic. But from what we could gather, it was like a grease fire in the kitchen that caught onto her. And then once it got onto clothes, the clothes started to melt, which continued the fire. And so she just continued to burn. And if you, you know, in those kinds of situations, obviously, you know, you would panic.

Right.

And but, you know, if you don't— if you don't have any idea or you've never gone through the thought process of like, what would I do if this happened? What would— what would I do? What would be my plan? What would be my next step in order to prevent this from spreading so that I don't get hurt, so other people don't get hurt? It's difficult when those high-intensity situations happen to actually respond well.

Yeah, and you wind up going into, you know, stress and panic mode.

Yeah.

And— and, you know, we've been taught that water puts out fire, right?

Right.

And, and that's not the case with a grease fire.

And it makes it worse.

It makes it worse.

Yeah.

And so just, you know, FYI, if you have a grease fire, do not put water on it.

Yeah, that is—

that's, that's going to make it worse. So, um, you know, I, I think that again, knowing some preventatives is going to be really helpful.

Yeah. So, so just, just to kick off, we're gonna— I'm gonna go through a just some brief facts about fire, um, that, that some of them were really surprising to me. But I mean, just right off the bat, and this one may seem obvious to say, and, but like, that fire is hot.

Sure.

And sometimes we just don't realize exactly how hot it is. And, but like, during a fire, room, you know, the room temperature at home can be, you know, like 100 degrees at, at the floor level, but get up to 600 degrees at your eye level.

My goodness.

You know, and, and so like, what happens when it gets to like 600 degrees is like, if you inhale smoke from like a 600-degree eye-level fire, which that's exactly where the air is going in, I mean, like, you, you know, you scorch your lungs. And that's actually at the temperature about when your clothes start to melt.

Wow.

And, and so that, that's a crazy amount of heat that you can't absorb, that you can't deal with. And, and there's other, you know, secondary issues going on, but like, I mean, just immediately, if your clothes are melting just not even from like physical fire contact, but like you kind of think about like that old Bible story of like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego that like as they, you know, the people who were charged with taking them into the fire actually fell, you know, according to the story, they fell and died before they even got the chance to throw these guys in.

Right.

And that's what we're talking about. And those guys weren't even in the fire. Those guys were just, you know, being damaged from the heat of the fire.

Yeah. And it goes back to the old adage, right? Stop, drop, and roll, right? The idea is get by Get below that level. Get below that level.

Yeah. It's not just because you want to like put— extinguish that flame, but like heat rises. Yeah. And you want to get away from that, from that high temperature as quickly as possible.

Absolutely.

So, and then the next one is, and, and this one seems counterintuitive and was probably one of the more surprising ones to me, is that the fire in a house is dark. You know, because if you're outside, if you've ever gone camping, you know, like you, you typically put the fire in a big open area So that you can see better, so that light spreads to the, you know, the places where the tents are, and people have a central gathering place and they gather towards that light. And you'll see like moths flying to the flame. It's, it's a good light source.

Sure.

What happens in a house is when a fire starts, even if that fire hasn't spread a whole lot, the smoke fills that void really, really quickly, and it's, it's almost like it's condensed, and it makes it almost impossible to see where you're going.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, so you have to, you have to be careful. Um, it's one of the reasons an evacuation plan is really important, because it's easy to get disoriented even in your own house.

Right.

Because it would be as if, you know, there were no lights on and, and it was pitch black in your house. Just knowing where to go, even though you've been there, you know, however many hundreds of times, uh, being disoriented is gonna happen.

Yeah. Yes. I mean, and not being able to see is one of the most disorienting experiences. Yes. Um, and so it's going to add to that stress. I mean, especially like, you know, if your eyes are open and your, your expectation is I'm going to be able to see where I'm going and then you start bumping into stuff and not only that, you've got smoke and stuff that you're dealing with. I mean, it's just, you're going to go into panic mode almost immediately. So that one was surprising to me. I would, I would have thought that, you know, at least with a fire in the house, you'd be able to see somewhat, but like, I just hadn't taken into account the smoke.

It has nowhere to go.

Yeah, except in your face.

Right.

Um, so the other thing is just how fast fire can, can spread. Um, and, and what they say is that it takes about 30 seconds for a small flame to become a big, big fire.

Wow.

Um, and, and again, the same, you know, almost by the same token, it, it takes even less time for smoke to fill the house.

Yeah.

Um, which again, and we'll go into this a little bit more later on, why it's so important to have multi-point smoke detectors because, you know, it— if it's hitting the smoke detector, it's not going to be long before it's reached the other ones and gotten to the other parts of the house. Sure.

Yeah. And, and one of the things to just— I mean, this is— this seems like common sense, but, but most of us, it doesn't matter what kind of climate you live in, we try to have a, a decent level of, of a low humidity Inside of our house, meaning that our house is a fairly dry place, you know, unless you're in a wet area like a bathroom or something. Uh, so, so you think it— once a fire starts, the drier the material is around it, the quicker that fire is going to spread.

Sure.

And so really, a home is a prime location for a fire to spread simply because everything in it is, is in a dry environment.

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Um, yeah, it's just scary stuff.

Yeah.

Any— uh, so, and the last one here is, you know, one is that it's just, it's a deadly situation, and not just because of the heat, not just because of the fire, not just because of, you know, getting trapped, but, you know, in order for there to have fire, that fire has to be fueled. And what fire consumes is oxygen. And if it's consuming oxygen, it's outputting other things. And most of the things that a fire is outputting, either from the fuel that it's burning or just the natural output of fire, are gases and things that are deadly and disorienting to us.

Yeah, and you need that oxygen.

Yeah.

And so, that's one of the things that— one of the reasons you need to get out of your house whenever a fire begins is because it's going to absorb that oxygen that you need to survive. So, and again, you wind up doing the only thing you can do, which is breathe.

Yeah.

As you breathe, you're getting that smoke. And so it's just like this compounding problem.

Yeah. And, and most of those things that you inhale from, from smoke and from fire cause disorientation and drowsiness. And so like, not only do you have the lack of oxygen, which, you know, messes with your brain and all kinds of bodily functions, but like you're also inhaling other things that are compounding those effects to your, to your body.

Sure.

Um, and so they, they, they actually say that like most of the time people don't die from the burn. They die from asphyxiation quickly. I mean, because that fire is drawing oxygen. It'll pull it out of you too.

Sure.

So, it can just happen really, really quickly.

Sure. Well, are you ready to talk about some checklist items?

Absolutely.

Okay. So, there are definitely some things that we believe you need to consider whenever it comes to preparing your home for the safety against fires. So, so to prepare yourself for those safety things, uh, and we're just gonna run down a list here, uh, and we're gonna start with, with electrical hazards, um, because I think electrical hazards, um, well, electricity just sparks, right?

Yeah.

And it doesn't take long, um, for a spark to turn into a flame. And so a couple of things you need to be thinking about is Um, look at your appliances. What kind of appliances do you have in your house and how old are they? Um, have you checked them periodically to make sure they're in good operating condition? Uh, and one of the things that is, is a real big hazard is your dryer.

Yeah.

In your home. And a lot of people don't recognize how quickly a dryer can catch on fire, specifically from just just not regularly cleaning out your lint trap.

Yeah.

And, and here's what's bizarre about that. On top of just cleaning out the trap, you may not realize that lint can actually get into other places of your dryer, right? So every once in a while, maybe once a year, pull your dryer out, pull the back off of your dryer, which is very easy to do. This is not a difficult process. And just look, and most people will find another you know, at least handful.

Oh, easily. Of lint. Yeah.

It's just down that your trap missed.

Yeah. And I would, I would even add, particularly if you're using like a natural gas dryer, I mean, because that's, that's essentially using a flame source.

Sure.

To, you know, ignite that burner to heat up that element. Yeah.

To—

and like, that's, that's just a— that could be a potential fire hazard right there. Now, I mean, obviously they build them so that they're protected from that kind of thing. But, you know, over time things happen. Um, and I'm actually a stickler for the, for the dryer vent. Um, and the one, the one within the dryer, obviously, I mean, that's the easy one to clean out. You pull out that little tray, you, you know, lick the tip of your finger and off it comes. It's not difficult.

Sure.

Um, and some people have a weird thing about the sensation you get when you touch it.

Yeah.

Because like then I don't know. They just don't like the way it feels.

Sure.

I say, get over it and get the lint out of there. Where I find people not checking this out is on the exterior of their home, you know, where that vent actually exits the building.

Sure.

A lot of lint gets trapped in those flaps.

Okay.

And sometimes people just have like a big opening right there. And I mean, even then, if you, if you get up there and look at it, you'll see lint all around the inside of that pipe.

Yeah.

But when you have these They're basically like trapdoors that open as air comes out of the dryer. Yeah, to let it get out, but they catch lint. Yeah, um, and it's real easy to spot that when people haven't been doing some regular home maintenance and looking at that kind of stuff. I mean, it can get caked with lint, especially when it's exposed to like moisture, and it just becomes like this really bad hazard on the outside of the house.

Yeah, and the flap is a good thing. Because it prevents animals from getting in your, inside your dryer, right? So that's a good thing. However, yeah, just checking these things. And again, this doesn't necessarily have to be something that you do all the time, but, you know, if you're outside and near that area, just take a look at it.

Yeah.

I mean, this isn't something you have to, you know, inspect, you know, every single little detail.

Sure.

But just kind of be aware of these sorts of things, right?

Yeah, and they, they can be inconvenient sometimes because sometimes people have like a laundry room on the second floor.

Sure.

And, and the builders tend to put those vents up a little bit higher so they're not necessarily as accessible to everybody who's height challenged.

Uh, what are you saying, Craig?

Get a ladder, that's what I'm saying.

Okay, yeah, yeah, definitely. But, but just be aware of that. And, and, you know, it's easy to talk about the dryer But there are other things. I mean, toasters can very easily catch on fire. And a lot of toasters, uh, you may or may not realize this, a lot of toasters have like a little tray that you can pull out and empty, you know, the breadcrumbs that fall down in there. And if not, just turn it over and shake it out every once in a while, right? Um, so, uh, these types of things and, and understand too, um, if, especially if you have a gas range. Um, be careful about the things that are around that.

Yeah, absolutely.

It does not take long for, for a flame to catch on to something else. So just make sure— a lot of people will put, you know, paper towels near those areas for, you know, obvious—

To clean or wipe up stuff. Yeah.

Obvious reasons. But make sure it's a safe distance away. Uh, these are just, you know, kind of common sense things, but it's something for you to look at because it doesn't take long before something accidentally gets there or happens that, you know, just kind of be aware of. Another thing is be careful about extension cords.

Hmm.

Extension cords are great for what they are because let's face it, a lot of times we need something plugged in. Everything we have these days runs off of electricity. And maybe you don't have an outlet where you need it. So you run an extension cord. A lot of people will even run an extension cord underneath a rug.

Right.

This is a big no-no. Do not run extension cords underneath rugs because again, you're putting an electrical item underneath a very combustible item.

Right.

So just be careful about that. And on top of that, if you do have cords that are connected to each other, they need to be a similar gauge wiring.

Right.

If you don't know what that means, basically, um, wiring has, uh, what's called a gauge, which is a thickness, right? And if you've got, um, if you've got an undergauge wire connected to a higher gauge wire, um, then you have a potential for electricity loss or sparking, those sorts of things.

So, and it's pretty easy to tell when you have those things mismatched because you'll feel that wire getting hot.

Yeah.

Yeah, you will.

Yeah, if— and especially, man, if you ever do something where you, uh, connect something and it feels warm, disconnect it immediately. I, I had something, um, one day I had taken the battery off of, uh, the house battery off of my camper, and when I went to go put it back, um, I accidentally switched the poles.

Ooh.

And I put it on and, you know, No big deal. I mean, it didn't blow up whenever you do that, but immediately that wire got hot.

Yeah.

And when that happened, I was like, I did something wrong. So just immediately, if you feel anything warm, take it off because it is not going to take long before that thing catches on fire for sure.

Absolutely.

So yeah.

And then there's, uh, the liquids in the house. We all keep, uh, cleaning agents, paints, gasoline, adhesives. And like, you're like, I don't keep gasoline in my house. Well, you have an attached garage and you have mowing equipment in that garage, if that's not electric, which most people don't, then you probably are storing gasoline in your house.

Yeah.

Not only that, I mean, there's— if you just look underneath your sink and you start turning some of these cleaning agents around and actually looking at the labels, you'll see pretty clearly that a lot of them are marked flammable.

Right.

A lot of cleaning agents even have things like alcohol in them.

Yep.

Uh, that are, you know, obviously very combustible. Um, if you, if you do keep any high-class booze in the cabinet, that stuff's extremely combustible.

Sure it is.

Um, and then a lot of people don't realize that like things like super glue, um, very, very flammable. Um, you know, anything with an aerosol is typically pretty flammable. Um, you start thinking about things like hairspray, which can be fun to kill spiders. Uh, oh yeah. Um, but, but yeah, it's, it's just good to be aware of where these things are at and where they're stored and that they are stored properly. Most things that are flammable, if you'll read the labels on these things, and the labels are there for a reason. They're there for you to understand what you're dealing with and what's the proper way to store these things, what not to store them next to, what not to mix them with.

Sure.

These are all important things because you can cause combustion by mixing the wrong 2 chemicals together. Um, it's, it's pretty uncommon for like household items, but it is possible.

Yeah, yeah. And that, that kind of leads us into another category here of housekeeping. And, and, you know, simple things like making sure your liquids are stored in a safe environment, right? And, um, like you said, knowing what's flammable and what's not. Um, paint is— can be a problem. As well.

Yep.

Uh, you know, anything that is oily. So things like Goo Gone, like some people keep that stuff around, which is, which is good.

It's a good product.

It's a good product, but it's going to be flammable. Um, and so make sure that, that those are away from heat sources. So for example, say you've got a laundry room. That's a good place for a lot of people in their minds to keep liquids for cleaning.

Yeah.

However, If you've got a dryer and you put those things directly above your dryer, if your dryer overheats, those things could heat up and could combust. So just be careful about those.

Well, even now, man, I mean, like with those front-end loader washer and dryers, they make those drawer units that go underneath them specifically for that purpose, for people to store cleaning supplies and things right underneath there. Right.

You just got to be extremely careful. And on top of that, Um, realize that, that little things like taking your garbage out regularly is a, is a good practice just for hygiene, right?

Yep.

But it's a good process for keeping you safe from hazardous things like flammable items. Um, same thing with garages. Uh, you know, a lot of times there's chemicals in there, whether it's fertilizers or, um, some people keep pesticides in there, in there. Um, a gas can.

Yeah, right.

You put a gas can in there. Um, lots of things, uh, that you just need to be careful about. Make sure you're aware where those things are, um, in relation to things that are combustible, for sure.

Um, yeah, and, and while— and, and we'll, we'll kind of go back to some of the statistics later because one of the things that I think surprised both of us is that the bedroom is actually one of the more places prone to fire starting. Yeah, but a lot of, a lot of times the place where you're you're at the risk to do a lot of these things is the kitchen.

Yes.

And doing some cooking, whether it's in the kitchen and a barbecue grill that's like next to the house, usually in the garage or on a patio or something like that. Um, anytime you're using these high heat and, and, you know, when you, when you start thinking about like the temperatures that your oven can create, um, you know.

Especially if you're cooking pizza.

Yeah.

I love me some pizza.

Yeah. I mean, 'cause like your, your oven can Upwards of 500 degrees.

Right.

Um, and if, you know, say you forget to turn that booger off, I mean, most, most of them have like a safety feature that's going to shut them down before they do any damage. But man, I've, I've seen ovens sometimes where, you know, if people don't clean them out properly, they leave like some gunk and some grime and some things that just turn into embers in that, in that oven. And then eventually they I mean, they basically act like coals.

Sure.

That oven reaches a certain temp and those things just ignite.

Yes, they do. Yeah. And again, know your appliances. I mean, especially if you're in a home that has older appliances, it's just something to keep, you know, at the top of your mind that you want to make sure that things are safe. Yeah. It doesn't necessarily mean that you need to be scared or afraid of them.

No, you should be afraid. I mean, the kitchen is basically like an evil temple that Indiana Jones would go through. I mean, there's sharp things, there's flammable things, there's fire shooting out all over the place, and then there's like extremely cold temperatures that you could, you know, get into. It's, yeah.

Well, when you put it that way, Craig, I guess you're right. But yeah, you know, some other things related to, you know, cooking or, or things like that. A lot of people have fireplaces in their home, uh, which are fine. That's good. It's a good way to heat your home. Uh, but make sure you've got a screen in front of it because especially if it's, if it's, uh, a natural burning fire, not a—

Yeah.

Not a gas fire because a spark can, can pop out into your, into your floor. If you've got carpet in that area, man, you've just got a, an accident waiting to happen. So, um, make, make sure your filters for your forced heating and air, units are, are cleaned and that they are, you know, if you've got a, a filter that needs to just replaced, that those need to be cha— replaced regularly.

Mm-hmm.

Um, typically every 2 to 3 months.

Yeah.

Is, is the best way to do that. Um, put it on a schedule, put it in your phone on a calendar under— as a reminder. Um, you know, one of the things going back to, uh, an earlier episode that we did, on the Ecobee thermostat, you can actually set some of these smart thermostats to alert you when it's time to change filters.

Yeah.

So utilize those features if you've got smart devices to make sure that you're taking care of that.

Yeah, you can even like voice command these reminders. Like, hey, remind me to do this every 2 months.

Exactly.

And I mean, like, these devices have become so intuitive and smart. They just, they can do that.

Yeah, absolutely.

So take advantage of it.

Yeah, and back to the fireplace real quick. Um, make sure your chimney is cleaned and checked periodically because again, um, you know, you get enough soot built up in there and you've got a problem as well. So, so get those things checked. If you live in an apartment, um, there are some things you probably need to check with, uh, maintenance with, you know, some of these sorts of things. If you are in a rental home, Make sure your landlord is regularly checking these things as well.

Oh, absolutely.

Yeah.

I mean, and to kind of piggyback on what you're saying about with apartments, I mean, and we don't want to like disparage any like company or organization, but like, you know, like apartments in general are not usually known for their well-maintained facilities. And just because, I mean, like they're, they're a burden on the bottom line. And so, you know, it's, it's good if you're going to move into a space like that to I mean, not rely on the idea that someone else has checked this stuff out, but I mean, go test those smoke detectors.

Right.

You know, early on when I originally got married and I was still figuring out how to use the kitchen, I would test them pretty regularly. Not intentionally, but I found out that they worked.

Yeah, and by the way, oddly enough, a kitchen is not an area that you're required to have a smoke detector.

Yeah, isn't that funny?

Yeah.

So, well, and part of that is because most Most kitchens, not mine, have vent hoods that can quickly exit a lot of these gases and smoke and things like that. Sure.

But again, know that system. Because the house I lived in previously, we had a vent hood, but it wasn't vented.

Right. It was an air circulator, right? Absolutely.

Yeah, and so that wouldn't necessarily help the situation. The home we live in now, It is vented. And so again, that's a, that's a positive thing. Use that whenever you can.

Yeah, I think that's, that's an important thing to bring up, Kevin. I don't think a lot of people know that there's a difference. Yeah, they just see a hood over an oven or a stovetop like that, and they just assume that like, oh, if I turn this thing on, it's taking the air outside.

So how's the easiest way to figure out if your vent hood is vented?

I don't know, Kev, tell us.

Open the cabinet above it and see if there's a big pipe Well, now, going through there, I will say this.

There are some that don't— like, if I were to put one in, there wouldn't be a cabinet above it.

Yeah.

And, and, and again, it would have to be like inside the wall. And there are ones that are like that.

Absolutely. But, um, check.

I mean, yeah, no.

Yeah. And one, one of the ways you— another way you can check is if it is not vented, then you will typically see some sort of a vent on the front of your— of that vent hood, and if you turn on the fan, you will feel air coming out of the front of that vent because it is circulating air, right? Uh, you can literally hear the fan going, right? Um, but it— but if you can't feel air anywhere, it, it's, it's exiting.

Yeah.

So, um, yeah, definitely check and see if you have one of those.

Which, I mean, just, just as a side, you ever seen like a downdraft vent?

I have.

Man, those things are cool.

Yeah, they are.

I saw this one— I saw this one time, it was, it was specifically designed for an island cooktop.

Yeah, my mother-in-law has one.

Oh, does she?

Yeah.

So like, and this one had on the backside of the stove, it was like this electronic thing that just slid up out of the cabinet.

Yep.

And I was like, oh, that is the coolest. It was like the first time I ever saw like a flat-screen TV come up out of a cabinet like that. It was so awesome.

Yeah, pretty cool stuff. And they work.

I mean, they work really well.

Yes, they do. In some ways they work better than the ones that are above. So So, um, they, they, uh, they definitely take in a lot of air. So, uh, you mentioned something just a minute ago that I want to jump into, and that is, uh, smoke alarms, smoke detectors.

Yes.

Uh, a quick story before we get there. Um, there, there are specific places where you're supposed to have smoke detectors, right? Um, and we, uh, when we moved into our home, there was not a smoke detector in the hallway outside of the bedrooms. And, uh, that's a place where we need one. And one night, um, shortly after we had moved in, the smoke detector I'd installed started going off.

Mm-hmm.

Woke me up at like 2 o'clock in the morning. This thing's beeping, beeping, beeping. And so immediately I'm out of my bed. My kids' bedrooms are really close, so I'm a little bit scared. And immediately the first thing I see is an orange glow. Dude, I am freaking out going, you've got to be kidding me. And come to find out, the smoke detector has an orange light on it as an escape, like helping you know, light the way for an escape route. And actually, I still had the packaging for this thing. I looked at it and it said, helpful amber glow for escape route. And I'm like, this is not helpful. It freaked me out.

Yeah.

Because, you know, Orange, it's the color of fire, right? So just a little something to look into. If there's escape lights, check to make sure they're not orange because you can freak yourself out pretty easily.

Yeah.

But there needs to be a smoke detector outside every sleeping area or every bedroom on every floor.

Yeah.

So if you don't have that, listen, Listen, smoke detectors are inexpensive.

Yes.

And you can buy 2 packs, you can buy 4 packs, you buy 8 packs. Buy them in bulk, they're cheaper that way. But buying these things are going to be a lot cheaper than losing some valuable things.

Yeah.

Especially your life, right?

Absolutely.

So make sure you have this. The other thing is test them every month. And again, use the reminder on your devices, your cell phone, uh, to, to set a reminder and say, I need to go push the button, make sure this thing works.

Yeah.

Um, there's nothing helpful about a smoke detector that doesn't work. And along with that, um, you need to change the batteries in those things at least every year. However, a good rule of thumb that I learned a long time ago was to change the battery in your smoke detectors every time the time changes. So twice a year, whether you fall back or spring forward, when the time changes, unless you live in a place like Arizona where the time doesn't change, change the batteries in your detectors at that time.

Yeah, if they are ones that require battery changes. There are some new ones now that I think they're rated for like 5 or 10 years.

Yeah, most of them are 10 years.

Um, and they're a little bit pricier, but I mean, you think 10 years, I mean, but you know, after 10 years, are you gonna remember to—

Yeah, and, and we actually went with a completely different system that, uh, they're, they're wireless devices. And, and some of these are wired through your home, which are, which are really good, uh, by the way. Uh, but if you don't have a wired system or you don't want to spend the money on a wired system, then And these wireless ones are really good, but we found some that are connected via a voice that will tell you where the fire is coming from. And they're connected to all the other devices. And this happens wirelessly.

Okay.

Now, there's a little bit of setup involved, but what's really cool is it will say something like, fire in the bedroom. And you can set which bedroom it is, fire in the master bedroom. Fire in the kids' bedroom. And if you're in the living area, maybe that's a long way away from your bedroom, the living area smoke detector will also say, fire in the bedroom, evacuate, evacuate.

Okay.

Um, and vice versa. If you're living there in the living area, it will say the same, you know, whatever room you're in. So there are options in there because, you know, for example, if there's a fire in my bedroom area, I don't wanna go back there.

Right.

If I'm not there already. So it kinda helps me know where— where to go and how position myself to keep myself in a, in a safe place.

Yeah, we probably ought to do a deep dive on a couple of those just to kind of talk about cost difference and some of the features, because that sounds like some cool stuff that I think, I think people would want to hear a little bit more about.

Sure. And by the way, there's smart ones.

Yeah, there are. I mean, you can, you can spend quite a bit of money on smart devices for smoke detectors, and I think they even do like combine like smoke and carbon monoxide detection. Yeah, they do. And there's all kinds of interesting stuff out there that you can get now.

Yeah, we need to get into some of that.

Yeah, but I don't want to, I don't want to leave some of the safety stuff before we talk about things like space heaters and, okay, and fireplaces. Yeah, and these, these are things that even I use in my home, and that's anything from like a radiator, like natural gas fireplaces, and we're back, or this, this lovely propane heater that's keeping us roasty-toasty here in the Homeowner Show studios.

I'm thankful for it.

Right, it's very nice. nice. Um, but, but these, these are obviously fire hazards.

Sure.

Um, and, and like, like even on like our radiator that we use downstairs in our house, um, and we, we use it particularly for the bathroom. I don't know, there's just one part of the house, it's, it's like connected to the stairwell with the bathroom and all this kind of— it gets, it gets extra cold in that part of the house. And so we have a, a radiator for the bathroom when it— during the cold season. Um, and if you look on there, there are warning labels for things like, don't throw clothes on the top of the radiator. Which, you know, to me, I always look at warnings and go, the warning's there because somebody did that.

Yeah.

And caused a fire.

Of course.

Yeah. And so, but like, while it seems so obvious, it also seems so casual for something shaped like that to throw a towel over the top of it. someone was like, I'm gonna get in the shower and when I get out, I'm gonna have a warm towel. You know, I can, I can see someone going through that thought process of like, oh, this will be nice. And then forget, I left that towel on top of the radiator and it just sits there and continues to heat and heat and heat and heat.

Right.

And so, and then things like, like our, like our lovely propane fireplace here, you know, it would be very irresponsible for us to finish this show close up shop, turn the lights off, and walk off with that thing still ignited.

Sure.

I mean, because that's, that's just a fire waiting to happen.

Yeah.

Um, but people do that, and, you know, it— but it's just good to be aware. I've done it, not on purpose, you know, I just got busy and forgot about what was going on and just let the propane run out.

Yeah.

Um, and won't ever do it again, right? scared the bejesus out of me when I came home. I was like, oh my gosh.

Oh.

Um, but, but yeah, I mean, like, these are, these are things, you know, if you're gonna have them on— and then this goes for like other things, like, you know, I will occasionally, not because of me, find a hair straightener left on in the bathroom.

Yeah.

Um, and, you know, just, it's just little things like that that, like, when bad big things happen and you have to go back and figure out why, you don't want to be you don't want it to be because you were in such a hurry to do something unimportant. Right.

Yeah, make the important things important.

Right.

Yeah, and, and don't leave those things out. And, and that kind of leads us into the, the next part of this, I think, Craig, which is making sure you have a fire escape plan.

Yes.

Um, something that's mapped out, and especially, most especially if you've got kids, um, talking with them about it and mapping it out for them. There's a reason that students and schools have fire drills, right? Um, these are things that, you know, when we get into stressful situations, man, our fight-or-flight response kicks in and we start just becoming silly and not thinking about things. So have a fire escape plan. If you don't have one, then figure out what your plan is.

Yeah.

Not having a plan is worse than having a plan that's poorly put together.

Yeah.

Uh, make sure that you that you have some sort of plan. So—

And I would, I will add on top of that real quick that like, have a plan and then don't be that guy or that gal that makes the plan and then prints it out on a really nice PDF sheet of paper, tapes it to the wall and just expects everyone to know that that's now the plan.

Right.

You know, no one knows that, no one's gonna look at that.

No.

And it's, you know, if there's a fire in the house, they're not gonna slow down to read it.

Yeah.

You know, but like you need to actually have that conversation.

Yes.

Um, that like, hey, I took some time, I really thought about what was best. And not only that, not only that, just because like, just because you've been thinking about it doesn't mean that what you thought up was the best thing. You need to have that conversation because there's probably other better ideas that either your spouse, your, your partner, your kids, whatever, have that will be better than your idea.

Absolutely. Yeah. And, and so little, little conversations, especially with your kids, of if you see or smell fire, what are you going to do next?

Right.

Right? And, uh, so, you know, having those conversations does— is, is really, really important. Um, and helping your kids know where the exits are.

Right.

And, and understand that, you know, that, that sounds a little silly because it's like, well, they know where the doors are in my house. They know where the front yard is and the backyard is. But what if they can't get out a door? You know, do your windows open? And have you opened them recently to make sure?

Yeah, can you open them?

Absolutely. Are your kids able to open them? I would suggest that if you have, you know, windows, especially if it's on a first floor, if you have windows in your kids' bedroom that can open, make sure that they are available to be opened. Now, I understand, I mean, trust me, I've worked with teenagers for a long time. You know, this whole idea of them sneaking out, obviously something you want to be careful of, right? You don't want your kids sneaking out at night. However, you also don't want them trapped inside their room.

Right.

And, you know, if all else fails, You know, tell your kid it's okay to break a window.

Yeah.

In order to get out of it. You know, you're not going to get in trouble if you break a window if there's a fire to get out. Yeah.

And you and I were talking a little bit before the show because these are, I mean, pretty candid conversations we've had to have with our kids. Because as comes up many times, our house is a little unique and our kids are on the second floor. And there's really only one way out.

Yeah.

That's a standard exit, and that's the stairway.

Yeah.

That goes to the front door. Um, and so we've had to have the conversation with them that like, look, if, if for some reason there's a fire on the stairway, you guys are going to need another way out of this house, and you're going to need a way out quick. And so here's the windows that are going to be your best options to get out of this house, and if those aren't available, here's your other options.

Yeah.

Um, and, and I think I was telling you, we even looked in the like potentially getting like some folding ladders for their, for their bedroom windows, um, just so that they have additional options and, and options for us to get to them if for some reason we need to, we need to get up there.

Yeah, absolutely.

Um, so it's, you know, it, it sounds morbid to be thinking about those kinds of things, but you wanna, you want to have had those conversations and, and, and know that your, your kids and your family and your loved ones have better options than just their immediate instincts. Yeah.

And so another thing along with that is, do your kids know your address? I mean, for instance, Craig, you and I've got younger children.

Right.

And the earliest opportunity that they can know the address to your house, the better. Because if they can get to a phone and dial 911, knowing your address, you know, this goes back to the episode that we had on dialing 911.

Right. Right.

Knowing your address is going to be one of the very first things that these first responders need to know, right? So, um, make sure that, that, that is not only something that you and your kids know very, very well, but also that is posted somewhere outside of your house. You know, a mailbox is really good, maybe on the curb is really good, because again, I mean, if your house is going up in flames, it's possible that if it's on your house, house, you may not be able to see that. So, uh, just something to think through.

Yeah.

Uh, the next thing, and, and we're, we're kind of winding down here, last couple of things: fire extinguishers. Um, you need to have at least one fire extinguisher in your house, and it needs to be charged.

Yeah.

Uh, and, and they don't last forever. No, they don't. And a lot of these ones that you buy, you know, at a Home Depot or somewhere like that, you know, they've got a certain number of years they're good, and then they're just not good anymore.

Yeah.

And so, so check the date on it, and again, put a reminder in your phone or, or on a calendar somewhere that says, on this date, I need to buy a new one.

Yeah. Um, I can imagine that being like one of the absolute worst situations is to pick up an extinguisher, go to put out a flame, and it'd just be worthless.

Yeah. And, and you think about it, you don't have an extinguisher in every part of your house. So if you're in your house and there's a fire and you run to go get the extinguisher and then to run back again, when we talk about how quickly these things heat up and spread, by the time you get back, you may be in a situation that if that extinguisher doesn't work, you've put yourself in a lot of risk.

Yeah.

By not being, you know, not having a fire extinguisher that's, that's ready to go. Um, so just don't just take for granted that you have a fire extinguisher in the house. Make sure that you've looked at it, you check it, um, and, and just regularly look at that thing, shake it up, make sure it works. And, um, all that stuff.

I think most of them have expiration dates on them.

They do. They have to. I mean, they're supposed to. If you have a fire extinguisher that doesn't have an expiration date, it's expired.

It's expired.

Go get a new one. Yeah. Uh, lastly, uh, recognize the fact that, um, the things outside of your house are also combustible. Sure. Um, you know, make sure that you've, uh, not got piles of wood around or that you've got piles of grass clippings or anything like that.

I think that's even something Justin brought up in our roofing episode when he was talking about, particularly around here, pine needles. Pine needles are extremely combustible. So, if you're not cleaning those off your roof— and there are services that will come and clean those off your roof. It's not terribly expensive. Get them out of your gutters. Get them off the roof. That's a fire hazard. Yeah, up there.

Absolutely. It is. Uh, that, that just about winds down my inspection list here.

Okay.

Um, any, anything else you want to mention?

Yeah, we've, we've got some statistics here that we wanted to, we wanted to run through for you guys just to kind of make you aware as to like how this affects, you know, people in your community and, and, and just around the country. And, uh, just thank you to the folks over at safehome.org who put, who put these up. Some of these are a little, a little bit dated, but I think they're still pretty relevant. Um, and there's— let's see here, we got 5 or 6, 6, 6 stats here we wanted to run through with you guys, and then we'll, we'll kind of close out the show. Um, but stat number 1, 3 out of 5 deaths as a result of home fires occur in

homes that do not have working smoke alarms installed.

And that's such an easy thing to fix.

Right, right. And then so like, and so what the, the obviously the point there is like Most of these deaths could have been prevented, right? Or potentially prevented.

And, and at an inexpensive cost, right?

Um, I don't think any cost would have— sure, I, you know, but like, yeah, it's, it's, it's extremely sad when you're like, for a, you know, a $6 smoke detector. Um, so, and stat number 2, about 7 people die in the United States as a result of a fire at home. Stat number 3, from about 2010 to 2014, approximately 1 in every 338 households reported a house fire each year. So, I mean, for like an average-sized neighborhood, that's probably like 3 to 4 homes per neighborhood.

Yeah, it's a lot more than I would have guessed.

Yeah. And stat number 4, U.S. firefighters responded to about 365,500 home structure fires in 2015, and that these fires resulted about $7 billion worth of damage, 11,000 civilians injured, and 2,560 deaths.

Oh my goodness!

And that was just in 2015. So it's— I mean, it's been several years since then, but I mean, I would imagine the numbers are about the same.

Those are high numbers!

Very, very high numbers. And here was the one that was just like mind-boggling to me, is that fires that start in the bedroom make up 51% of all Oh, wow. So, I mean, like, if a fire starts in the bedroom, there's, you know, more than a 50% chance that it's going to be a fatality. Yeah.

And, you know, one thing I want to just bring up really quickly here is, um, if you're a smoker, man, you've got to be extra careful with some of this stuff because, um, if you smoke in or around your home, you just got to make sure that that you've got your cigarette butts put out.

Right.

And, you know, a lot of apartments will even require, have this requirement of no smoking in bed.

Yeah.

Right? Well, because a lot of people will. They'll wake up or they'll go to sleep doing that if you're a smoker. That's a dangerous game to start playing.

Yeah, absolutely.

So just be careful.

So I don't think we have anything else for folks today, but hopefully we covered a good bit of information for you guys. and covered this issue well and that you learned something from it. And if you haven't yet, go ahead and hit the subscription button there in iTunes, Stitcher. What are the other ones, Kev? Google Play. Yeah. We're all over the place.

Yeah, absolutely.

Subscribe to the show, listen to the show, review the show, tell the show, tell the show? Tell people about the show. Yeah. You can tell the show stuff if you want, but no one's gonna listen. If you're one of those people that like to talk to your car, I suppose. You can tell the show all you want.

All you want.

It won't tell anybody.

That's right. Yeah, and maybe there's something we've missed. If there has, send us an email at info@homownershow.com. And let us know if there's something else that we missed. We'd love to correct that on a future episode.

Yeah, you can send that to us on Facebook or Instagram as well.

Sure, absolutely.

We're always active up there.

Yeah.

And you can, you can visit with us there. You can share some homeowner tips there. Um, and, or just, you know, get to know Kevin and Craig.

Yeah, absolutely. Well guys, uh, thanks for tuning in. And, uh, like we say all the time, we're here every Tuesday. So hit the subscribe button. Don't miss an episode.

And YouTube on Thursdays.

Yeah, most of the time.

Usually.

Depending on the week, but we're trying to do better about that. So, um, yeah, YouTube hopefully on Thursday. And, uh, regular podcast on Tuesday. So until then, have a great week.

See ya.