Fire Safety Checklist For Your Home

The importance of fire safety in the home cannot be stressed enough. Unfortunately, it’s one of those things that far too many people overlook until it’s too late. Looking back over the situation and pointing out all things that you should have done before a fire isn’t going to do anyone any good. What you need is to look at those things now. If you’re reading this article, it means you’re already showing interest. The only thing left to do is follow through.

What you really need to do is take a walk through your home and examine anything that could be a fire hazard. The problem is there are so many things to consider that a walk through won’t do you any good, unless you already know what to look for. Don’t assume that fire hazards will be obvious. Again, you don’t want to ever look back and think “I wish I’d thought of that.”

The first thing you should do is make a checklist. That checklist should include all the things that you need to look into when examining the fire safety level of your home. There are many places that you can find such lists, but if you do a little research you should be able to put an easy checklist together on your own. The types of things you should be putting on that list are looked at briefly in the rest of this article.

Electricity is a big category that will require quite a bit of examination on your part. That’s because electrical fires are relatively easy to start, and the faults that cause them are quite common. You should therefore, be prepared to examine all of your outlets and make sure you don’t have too many things plugged into them. You should also ensure you don’t have things like heaters sitting on the wires. Having a professional electrician check your wiring would be great if you can swing it, but if you are sure a qualified person installed the electricity during current fire codes, you should be fine.

In the winter, you will likely have heaters plugged into to various places, otherwise you’ll have some form of central heat. In either case, you will need to make sure that the heat sources are all far away from anything flammable. Don’t be lazy about this either. If a heater is in a place where it can easily be knocked into a dangerous area, move it or secure it.

Should a fire ever start, it can spread surprisingly fast. Some homes can actually burn to the ground in a matter of minutes. To help prevent such an easy spreading of flames, make sure you take the time to check out the materials your house contains. That includes everything from highly flammable couch cushions and curtains, to flammable wallpaper.

When making your list, be sure it’s complete. You can always phone up your local fire department for tips on this. That’s all part of their job. If at any point you are in doubt about whether or not something in your home isn’t fire safe, don’t take chances. Call in a professional to check things out. In the long run these precautions will be more than worthwhile.