Worrying info re children and smoke alarms

[LaChaiseVerte]

This piece of research seems to show that children, boys in particular, may not respond to smoke alarms if they are asleep. It recommends having alarms in each child's bedroom, something I may now look into.

[NonnaMai]

I can believe that. We have a fire plan and I recently decided to test it.

I activated the smoke detectors once the dc were in bed asleep.

DDs 2 and 3 age 6 and 10 got up and put pillows under their doors then opened a window and called for help. This is exactly what they have been told to do.

DD 1 age 12 went into meltdown and rushed straight out of her room without doing anything to check if there was a blazing inferno right outside.

DS 1 and 2 age 13 and 8 snored right through.

We live in a three story house with 4 very loud wired detectors. God knows how they didn't hear them.

[froggiebabies]

I believe it. Our wired smoke alarms went off recently and 4 yr old eventually woke but 7 year old didn't.

One of the units is right outside bedroom door and dh and I could barely hear ourselves think.

Very worrying.

[EldonAve]

not sure why it's so worrying unless you are leaving your children alone in the house

[HarrietSchulenberg]

I think the point is that the detectors wake the adult and the adult ensures that everyone is out. A detector would go off before an adult was overcome by smoke and an adult would rouse sleeping child by whatever means necessary. Personally I would drag mine out by the hair if that was the only way to get them out in the event of a fire.

[LaChaiseVerte]

I thought that first of all Eldon, but I guess we may be in a different part of the house, unable to reach them, or incapacitated by smoke/flame ourselves. As Nonna says, you have a plan you go through with DC but they can't put it in action if they are asleep. You may hear it but be unable to respond, you want DC to have the best chance of survival, and early warning is key to that.

[froggiebabies]

Certainly we never leave the children alone. They are 7 and 4. Worrying for the reasons the OP has just given. What if we weren't able to get to them?

Until our recent false alarm I thought no-one could sleep through the sound but the 7 year old was completely oblivious.

[Meglet]

I already have smoke alarms in every bedroom / room.

But I used to work for the fire service so I've had the fear of God put into me about fires (and road safety).

My house is far from perfect but every night I make sure escape routes are always clear of clutter, nothing on the stairs and routes to the front or back doors.