Deck the halls with working smoke alarms and practise escape with children

A student investigating the effectiveness of a standard smoke alarm in waking children has discovered that most families do not practise evacuation with their children or regularly test their fire alarms.

“In a survey carried out as part of my BTYSTE project, 52 per cent of respondents did not have a fire evacuation plan in place in the event of a fire in the home compared to 4 percent of the respondents who had practised an evacuation from their home in the event of a fire,” said Patrick D’Arcy, a student at Castlepollard Community College.

Patrick is representing his school in the first ever virtual BTYSTE (BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition) with a device he has programmed to aid the safe self-escape of children in the event of a fire.

“Research has demonstrated that the standard smoke alarm is not effective in waking most children. This information prompted me to consider what technology could be used to help children when a fire breaks out in their homes. The project is called ‘Wide Awake; when every second counts’.

“When I was developing the device, there was one clear message coming back from all the research and all the experts I spoke with; have a plan in place and practise it. Don’t wait until there is a fire and hope everyone knows how to get out safely”

Patrick’s Wide Awake is not a smoke detector, but instead a piece of technology that will provide sounds that have proved successful in waking children, and other functions to help them to leave the home as quickly as possible in the event of a fire.

“Working smoke alarms in the home, everyone knows, can literally save your life but, in the survey I conducted, 3.9 per cent of respondents tested their smoke alarms once a week and 11.9 percent tested them once a month. A third of the respondents trusted it was working because every so often burning toast set it off, and just over 1 in 8 of the respondents never tested their alarms.”

Patrick was motivated to investigate the phenomenon of a smoke alarm not waking a child after hearing a discussion at home about how his own sister slept through a smoke alarm as a small child and his little cousins the same.

“My mum got my sister’s hearing tested immediately and was told by the doctor ‘that child can hear the grass growing’.

"But when I heard my aunt saying it had also happened in her home, it got me wondering if it is a wider issue. When I tapped it into Google, it came back with 26,600,000 results; including a BBC investigation where a smoke alarm woke only one of eight children and the child that it woke up just got their teddy bear and went back to bed.

“Can you imagine being a panicked parent, home is on fire, alarm is sounding and your children are sound asleep in their beds – the precious seconds you lose trying to get to them up, wake them up and get them out. That is why having a plan, practising a plan, testing your alarm and – of course – preventing it in the first place, are all things that can be done today.”

Patrick is submitting his project on December 30 and has a Facebook Page facebook.com/codladhtrom, which means sound asleep, where he is sharing helpful tips on fire safety, so swing by and like and share his posts. If you would like to make a plan, see westmeathcoco.ie/en/ourservices/emergencyservices/fireservice/yourfiresafety/#AreYouPrepared.

READ ALSO: https://www.westmeathexaminer.ie/2021/01/06/btyste-2021-goes-virtual/