Differences Between Smoke Alarms & Carbon Monoxide Detectors

Features

• Carbon monoxide detectors do exactly what their name suggests. They are designed to detect levels of CO, and an alarm sounds when the levels are too high. Some carbon monoxide detectors are rectangular devices plugged into outlets, usually with a battery backup. They measure the amount of carbon monoxide over time. CO is dangerous when it rises to high levels very quickly.

  Carbon monoxide detectors can also be mounted on the ceiling, using batteries or electricity, or both. Some may be found in combination with smoke detectors. If you are renting, ask your landlord if your home is equipped with a CO detector. The requirements in residential buildings vary from state to state.

  Smoke alarms detect smoke in two ways. Either there's a light sensor that triggers an alarm when the light is blocked with smoke particles (photoelectric detectors), or there is a small electrical current that triggers the alarm when the current is blocked by smoke (ionization detectors). Some smoke alarms use both types of technology, and others include a heat sensor as well.

Warning

• Many homes have smoke detectors that are solely battery operated. This means that it's critical to test your smoke alarm monthly to make sure it still works. Also, never remove the batteries in an attempt to silence the alarm for your convenience. It's too easy to forget to replace them, causing a deadly situation in your home.

Considerations

• Smoke alarms only save lives if they alert people to smoke. Having a smoke detector in the basement while you sleep on the top floor of the home makes it unlikely that you'll hear it. The best placement for smoke detectors is in each bedroom, directly outside each bedroom and on every level of the home.

  Similarly, CO detectors need to be placed near sleeping areas so that people can hear them while asleep. To minimize false alarms, do not place them near furnaces or in garages, for instance.

  For both smoke detectors and CO detectors, it's a good idea to interconnect them so that if one goes off in a home, all of them sound.

Benefits

• Fires can spread in minutes, filling homes with deadly smoke and gas in a short period of time. Carbon monoxide can slowly build to lethal levels. CO detectors and smoke alarms give people a few extra minutes, or even seconds, to exit their homes before being overcome by smoke, fumes or fire. Most fatal home fires occur in homes without smoke detectors or with non-working detectors.

Take Action

• It's clear that lives can be saved with the use of both smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors. Though they protect against very different things, both are critical to your family's safety. If your home isn't equipped with them, install them immediately. It's a matter of life and death.