Good morning Eli I’m your host Matt shrock here for another healthy Al podcast and we are into the summer months we’re in that summer break if you are a student and not taking classes this summer but there’s still topics we want to talk about and some that are
Very pertinent uh for summer and preparing for the the fall semester already so we’re going to jump right into it today we are talking about fire safety and I’m going to get more into why that’s important right now uh in a minute uh but uh I do want to introduce
Our guests first I have two guests with me today first up is Robert Simmons he is with champagne fire and is Deputy Fire Marshall Robert thanks for being here thank you for having me also joined by uh Mike Brown he works with the University of Illinois in facilities and
Services he is our associate director for Code Compliance Mike thanks for being here thank you as well so uh there are some topics we talk on uh healthy Lina that are very new that are very unknown but there’s some that are very familiar to us we’ve heard most of our
Lives and that’s kind of where we fall with with fire safety but it’s important to come back to them and it’s important to uh give them that uh that human feel that um that relatable uh aspect to it and so um for me personally when I think
About fire safety the first thing that comes to mind is warnings on packages and I’m going to date myself a little bit but Smokey the Bear um that’s I mean still Smokey the Bear is the one that pops into my head and that’s pretty much it because that’s what i’ I’ve heard
Most of my life but while those are important um the problem is that sometimes things become so familiar that we start to dismiss them that it’s just oh yeah I’ve heard that oh yeah I know that and you move on and and that can be really dangerous um but then it’s
It’s I like it sort of the car insurance that I don’t think about I pay about it I pay it I don’t think about it until there’s an accident then all of a sudden I’m trying to remember all the stuff that details all the things did I
Prepare did I not prepare and fire safety is kind of the same way you a lot of us kind of dismiss it oh yeah I know that but then in the moment when we need it it’s really important to know um know what’s going on but also it’s also
Important to prepare so that you don’t have those you know hopefully no one deals with it and we hope no one has to ever call on that uh that knowledge but just in case it’s important to have that knowledge and that’s kind of why I want to have this conversation today the
Other aspect of it for us is our most of our audience is college students first time out of the home on their own in an apartment or a dorm or a house even that they are making the choices they are making the decisions on what they have
In the home how they how they set up their home the things they do in their home and so it’s really important for these these first time consumers to have a a baseline on what fire safety is so um let’s start with the home let’s start there because that’s something that
Everyone has in common that they have a place today day um what are some of the most important aspects when if you were talking to somebody who’s a first time on their own what are some of the most important aspects to remember when you’re trying to think of fire safety at
Home well uh I I think to tag on to what you said a little bit it is important to remind people that yeah it is a low frequency event fortunately when fires occur but the problem nowadays is is that we have so much garbage and fuel in
Our lives that fires develop a lot more quickly than they used to um and really the instances May statistically have gone down but it’s always because of some major event that’s happened that new codes are put in place safety standards and all that so it is it is
Easy to get complacent because I would say overall things are safer but on the other end it’s a low frequency but very high-risk situation when it occurs things are a lot more dangerous once they occur than they used to be so uh just adding on to you bringing that up
Uh one of the first things that I will always stress the people and I could even get complacent about it sometimes myself um you’ve heard the messaging about smoke alarms change the batteries check your smoke alarms time change and I don’t even know what’s going on I’ve
Heard time change may go out the window here in the next year I don’t really care for it myself I’m not a farmer wasn’t a farmer whatever I know the reason for it in history but uh um so that messaging may have to change eventually but really I want to stress
To people the importance of making sure the smoke alarms are working uh depending on the type of residence you live in is going to dictate whether you have a full-on fire alarm system or whether you have battery powered smoke alarms um the new state law has gone
Into effect that all of them are supposed to be the sealed battery smoke alarms where you don’t even have to worry about changing a battery uh moving forward once they’re in place um but to add a a real feeli to it or a human element um we’ve had seven fatalities
And then two others that were brought back to life at the hospital just in the last 3 years and in every case we couldn’t document or know for sure that there was not a working smoke alarm um I mentioned already the Plastics the nasty fuels everything is made cheaper
Nowadays um things that go to full combustion a lot quicker than they used to they put off a lot of nasty smoke I think most people know that most fire deaths it’s not burning up in a fire it’s smoke inhalation that kills people I mean these smoke alarms will go off
Quickly um and they will make the difference in life or death so I just want to stress that first off I mean everybody can get complacent but working smoke alarms not covering them making sure they’re they’re in working condition is of utmost importance and then that’s important to to remember
That that smoke alarms can be annoying yep and here’s here’s why I say that because I I’m guilty of this when I was first in college first going out i s off the smoke alarm a lot because I was learning to cook and I was not good I’m
Still not great but and so I set the smoke alarm all and there were times where I was like I’m just going to pull the battery I’m just not going to deal with this m and then you forget to put the battery back in or it’s just a bad
Idea in general yeah that’s a bad idea it’s a bad idea in general and so U it’s really important to to remember that they’re there for a safety reason and yes they can be annoying if they’re annoying because you’re burning your food stop burning your food um you know
It’s one of those kinds of things but we’ve all been there it goes off and you grab like a towel or a paper plate you’re faned on the smoke alarm trying to get it to be quiet um but it’s important remember that they’re there for a really important reason that
Hopefully you never actually need for for a dangerous situation but it’s something that you you don’t want to take lightly and mess with yeah and as I mentioned already I mean they’re kind of becoming more Carefree now I mean we don’t have to worry about the battery issue unfortunately we know in some
Instances it just means people are going to pull the whole device down but there’s also misconception we get questioned all the time because we occasionally get grants and go out and do smoke alarm installs for people you don’t need one in your kitchen uh you don’t really need one right outside the
Kitchen the recommended places for NFPA standards is in all the sleeping rooms um and then one on each floor carbon monoxide is another issue it’s odorless colorless gas put off by incomplete products of combustion so that’s a concern they should be there too um but usually the nuisance alarm issue there’s
Still a cause for it it’s either too close to the kitchen we get a lot of those calls um or you’re doing something improperly or incorrectly that’s setting them off anyway so there are malfunctions but yes things have changed quite a bit but that’s one thing I’ll
Point out there you don’t need one in your kitchen that’s good I didn’t know that one year so um Mike you work a lot of um on campus stuff um is there anything as far as smoke alarms anything that or or any kind of profession stuff there no
I’m just ring on to Robert’s points um the I’m An Architect by trade and got into Code Compliance um after years of working as an architect doing construction management and stuff but as far as the design uh Robert’s right in regards to the placement where the code
Dictates where you put the smoke alarms um and then they have the new devices out that are combination smoke alarm carbon monoxide um so those are always good things uh just again do uh replace those batteries twice a year at least uh um don’t cover them up we see I think
Robert sees a lot of times he goes in and does inspections in the dorms and people might be hanging their clothes off the sprinkler heads and stuff like that so that’s that’s something else in the dorms we definitely want to have the students shy away from because we want
That if something was to happen we want that sprinkler to be operational um Robert brought up a good point too about today’s uh uh products are a lot of plastics and that’s what’s really causes a lot of that black smoke and the chemical and and that’s what causes the
Death and fires so related in in as well I think is a good point I wanted to bring up in regards to keeping the smoke alarms operational and clear and free is keeping the fire doors closed and that’s fire doors in the hallways you’ll see going to the stairwells those are your
Egress uh stairwells those are your paths to safety um those doors are the buildings designed for those erass U for to have a smoke protection and uh and and a 1 hour fire protection at at a minimum so you get in those stairwells that’s your safety that’s your way out
And that’s going to protect you and so keeping those doors closed a lot of people like to you know choke them open and um that’s something that we really uh are constantly having to do and spread the word on campus to keep those those doors closed um if you ever do in
A room and and happen to have a fire incident and you are exiting close the door behind you that also is an extra layer of safety to mitigate the um the progression of the smoke throughout the building yeah and I’ll piggy back on that a little bit more cuz when we were
Coming up with our topics uh we didn’t really go into it another reminder to people yes please do not hang anything from the sprinkler head sprinkler piping that’s exposed in your property I always tell the frats and sororities when we go in we have incidents all the time where
People hang their clothes hanger on a head they go to grab it and activate the sprinkler system it’s a lot of water that’s going to flow out uh it’s not going to stop till the fire department gets there it is there for your protection to keep you safe it’s kind of
Out of sight in a way out of your way so just be careful around those don’t hang anything on them and then yeah just finally to get back on the smoke alarms we mentioned don’t cover our crews respond to incidents uh we find on inspection where people have put tape
Over the device they’ve put a plastic bag over it that defeats the purpose of the device if you are having issues where it’s going off for you don’t know why the reason is call somebody needs to check it out and see what the problem is too so don’t cover
Uh remember the sealed battery thing’s coming you may live in a apartment building dorm whatever where you have a fire alarm system it’s all tied in it’s being maintained by people just leave the device Alone um and it’ll protect you one thing I wanted to ask is um
About fire extinguishers because I know that I’ve seen them I’ve never actually used one in my own life um and so I know the first time I saw I’m like oh yeah it’s there but if I had to use it would I really know how um and I I assume
There listeners who are in the same boat so if somebody’s curious about there doesn’t even know where can they find out about how to even use a fire extinguisher uh well that’s a good question uh you see a lot of times you don’t even realize you walk past them
Every day and don’t even pay attention to them and then the moment you think you may need one it’s like oh GE where is it so by Design they are supposed to be within 75 ft of each other so at any point inside the building you should be
Within 75 ft of a fire extinguisher um when the fire extinguishers are provided in the building for that type of use so you don’t have to worry about what type of fire signature you have um but I’m in the same boat I haven’t used a fire signature myself and and uh thinking
Back so we”re trying to put together um we’ve started it this spring and we’d like to continue on we’re doing uh fire extinguisher training um we’re going to have a p our office my office FNS and code fire is going to have um a PDF go out and advertisement and on we’re going
To hold some individual classes probably eight to more people at a time 1 hour class and uh it will give you a simulation of what to expect and how to operate a fire extinguisher um we also have an A a resource online which is with the office of the vice chancellors
For research you go to their website they have um an online course you can take as well and I think I really would encourage everybody to take a look at that and look for our PDF coming out soon and again those resources are in
Our will be in our bio if you uh want to click on those and follow up with that um we try and put all those resources in anytime anybody speaks about anything on our program um that they’re easily accessible so check that out for for any questions you have with fire sers and
Mike brought up with the uh website he mentioned but also when we were talking about resources and local resources check out FNS code fire code and fire website um and again don’t ever hesitate we give our contact information uh at some point in this speech but um reach
Out if you have questions questions if you’re unsure of something what you should do if if you’re planning a party if you’re planning any type of event reach out to the local fire department especially the Frat sorties um but the UI uh businesses or the the different schools departments you’re reaching out
You really should be going through FNS per planning to special events coordination group as well so they’re all there to help yep every once you enjoy your experience yep we want you to have fun but be safe one of the other uh main aspects I wanted to
Touch on for at home is uh power strips uh plugs and this kind of ties into the whole don’t cover the uh the spectular heads don’t hang anything everybody likes to I mean dorm rooms are pretty sterile and and non-descript everybody likes to make them their home and they
Like to make them look good in departments too you like to make it look like you want it and you know one of the big things for a lot of college students and for high school students my daughter is the same is to have interior lighting
You know like a Str of lights whether it be Christmas lights or deck lights or you know something LED um but you know depending on how your your room is set up you may have one or two plugs in that room where it’s not not in the most
Convenient place so you run a power bar and then you plug everything into the power bar like you know you have you have your your uh your lights you also have your phone charger and your you know Chromebook charger and something else running off of that your interior
Uh uh for refrigerator your dorm refrigerator all these things um so how do I know if I’m running too much off of something or I know you know it’s a dangerous situation because I’ve got too many things plugged into one power bar or I’m pulling too much energy from that
Rober prob got a more technical but I I know the par strips come with so many you know Outlets uh places to put in and to plug in and you don’t want to overload that by putting in another adapter that can allow you know two or three more plugins or I think Robert’s
Run into a place on campus where we found that there was a power strip plugged into the wall and then now another power strip plugged into that power strip that’s common now so that just starts overloading that’s a little more common sense just don’t put any more plugs in that that’s that’s it’s
Not already made for uh those newer ones if you have an old one um you want to get it replaced with a newer one because the newer ones are GFI protected so if there is an overcurrent um something will if if something was to spark that will shut everything down and protect
Your devices as well and uh prevent prevent a fire some of the older ones don’t have that Extra Extra Protection on it and we actually go as far as telling people we we’re responsible for certified housing dorms fraternities sororities the private certified housing like Bramley larger uh family living the
U ofi own dorms same requirements um big thing to remember on those we want it to be circuit protected devices too everybody knows those little two or three plug brown white green adapters those are used a lot of times they’re typically not used for what they’re
Rated for um check the packaging on it you can go maybe a little more nerdy and check the tags on your devices to see what amperages there are I mean what the rating is for it but the big thing is you’re not supposed to have the little unapproved multiplug devices which is
Those little two or three plug adapters like Mike said if you’re having to plug a power strip into another power strip then you’re not you have too many things uh we know that two of the biggest issues we run into with facilities nowadays is the amount of receptacles
For all the devices in our lives and also storage space but um sticking on the power strips and overloading I mean there’s just some common things that you’ll see if devices are blowing fuses if things are overheating uh if your lights are flickering there’s probably an issue um biggest thing with those you
Mentioned fridges I mean plug appliances directly into the wall outlets um that’s the best course of action for those we know phone chargers we’ve even seen these little bed risers with the receptacles on them and typically like a phone charger is okay okay for that but you shouldn’t be plugging your window
Air conditioning unit and your refrigerator and coffee maker or whatever you’ve got into those devices um and having circuit protection is the big thing uh there’s a difference between circuit protection and surge protection one’s for your device one’s for the circuitry um if it’s popping that and doesn’t have an onoff or reset
On it or resets what I meant a simple onoff or the the little switch it should say reset on it but it’ll tell you on the packaging if it is circuit protected as well so that’s the big big things to remember for that and a lot of this is
Just being conscientious just being um proactive in how you look how you look at it um and you know CU I know that there’s certain places in my own home where I’ve had to use a a power bar but I knew it was for something larger like
A TV or ANL that and so I go make sure I go get something that’s more heavy duty than the $3 one in the you know in the corner of Walmart or whatever it may be uh I’m looking for something that I know has a little bit more power and
Protection to it yeah and and another good point on that is too is remember that any of these devices put off heat you asked about the lighting too um there’s a lot of LED lighting out there the little strips that you see that people are moving to that’s better the
Devices themselves you can tell when they’re putting off heat you can feel it and just recognize that anything that puts off heat is potentially in the long term an ignition Source I mean a fire issue so uh we have to be cautious about covering things up be cautious with
Cords that they’re not running under carpet things like that but the biggest thing um again is just recognize if they’re putting off heat you’ll notice sometimes um your phone overheating when it’s charging if it’s not on the right charger too you’ll learn with the the new battery issues that we’re having and
I’ll talk about the scooters and ebikes thing in a minute but um if your phone is incredibly hot while it’s charging it may not be the appropriate charger for your phone I think it’s recommended on all those that you buy the Char or use the charger that’s for your phone and we
All know it’s easy to just grab whoever’s Chargers available or whatever fits in whatever plug but um try to use the Chargers that your items are rated for and and like we’ve stressed already just use the number of receptacles plugs that you’ve got and then overcurrent
Protection so that fits into one of the things I I did want to make sure that we addressed and you you’ve touched on it already is that you know we’ve hear a lot about fire safety and there’s lot of things we know like smoke alarms I know
No candles you know open Flames kind of things like that Power Bars hurt a little bit but but um there are things that you need to be aware of like heat coming off of appliances that if you don’t have it in a ventilated space or you have it where it’s cluttered and
There’s stuff that can light up real you know even it’s dust or plastic you know plastic packaging or something like that a fake flower something like that if you’re not aware of that heat coming off you could be in danger of an ignition source that you’re not even thinking of
These these are the things I wanted to talk about because College students all of us but especially college students first time on your own you have so many things you’re trying to balance you’re trying to balance your you’re doing your own laundry you’re doing your own finances doing your own Healthcare you
Got your classes you got your social stuff and things sometimes fall through the cracks and these little items you know I’m just going to throw this in the corner and then be done with it can be a dangerous kind of situation yep oh yeah definitely and that can happen at the
Home as well and even in my background is when I was going through architecture of school in studio space we’re going through design I got all my design papers I’m going through scratching you know um scribbling stuff out going through all sorts of schematics and and
And I rip it rip it off and throw it on the ground next you next I got a pile of stuff so you know God forbid if a flame ever lit up in that that situation but same thing can happen at home yeah exactly same thing can happen at home
With magazines newspapers um any of that kind of stuff you know your all your old reports and and stuff that you’ve done doing for school and that starts you know all the books and everything else that they have you know when that you got piled up next to a flame Source or a
Heat Source that’s that’s a do definely could be a hazard so it’s just something to be aware of yeah we we should stress we should have stressed at the beginning and again now cuz I do it going into the fraternities and sority and I’ll say honestly the fraternities are usually
Worse just being honest with those listening but uh um all this stuff that we’re throwing out here we want you to have fun uh I tell them you can have your room as dirty as you want it to be make sure that you have a way out um try
To do some cleaning throw away garbage things like that but um just recognize that the big thing is is there there are codes in place especially on housekeeping things too we have requirements on not storing everything in your mechanical rooms around your water heater some of those uh gas water
Hereat I mean a pilot light they don’t think about the small Flames there you got to worry about your stove top interesting off to the side uh com comment on that you talked about heat producing devices um people that have pets uh need to be cautious don’t store
Stuff on top of your stove either um we’ve had a couple of documented cases and there’s videos out there for people who don’t believe it that pets jumping up trying to get stuff on the stove can turn on burners in some cases um that’s something people don’t think about
That’s kind of strange off the cuff I do see a lot of dogs around campus so be cautious that’s another good reminder just don’t use your stove top for a storage area either um but yeah I mean I was going down the route with the fraternities and I say and priorities
And you know live your life have fun we just want you to be safe um if you want to live completely sloppy dirty whatever make sure you have a pathway to get out and and I’m just going to throw it out there I mean doing a little bit of
Cleaning every once in a while is a good idea for the buildup of flamable materials too so we we could stay on the the home topic for for the rest of the time I mean we very easily could but I want to move on a little bit there’s one
Thing you mentioned that I had we hadn’t talked about that I hadn’t thought of um and that was the scooters and ebikes so would you would you share a little bit about what you why that’s an issue that you’re that you need to be aware of so there’s been national news and stories
Um New York City obviously being a large city has had a lot of fires with those batteries overheating um there’s issues with again the charging devices eventually basically I’m not a scientist I understand and I’ll misuse some terminology but basically once these batteries go into thermal runaway where they’re overheating there’s no stopping
It I mean fire will occur and we don’t need to go off on the topic too far but basically on campus I mean it’s being determined that those ebikes scooters should not be brought into buildings um definitely don’t charge them indoors don’t bring them indoors um they’re
Still looking at how we’re going to address that but that is something to keep in mind I mean it’s not they’re the big item right now but I mean it’s it’s all the batteries in our life now the lithium ion batteries things like that they’re not inherently bad but just like
Most fires that we have the top five causes of fires every year there is a human involvement in them even when we think about cooking electrical mechanical it’s not typically failure it’s improper use and maintenance and it’s kind of the same way with the charging not allowing heat to dissipate
Covering things up um but just it just so happens that it’s those scooters and ebikes that are the big ones causing fires lately I mean a couple years ago we had the cell phone batteries and the the one of the Samsung phones there’s been other ones there’s vaping devices I
Mean it’s it’s heat dissipating is the big thing and overcharging things like that so just the general stance on the ebikes and scooters from the UI side is that they shouldn’t be inside of buildings yeah you think it just takes a little while to light a fire but it
Doesn’t if it has the right accelerance it’s it’s gone and it’s right there well and outside you’ve got your natural uh oxidizing agent all the time your oxygen is Flowing freely so yeah it a lot of factors going right there that can make it take off quickly and and if anybody’s
Got questions about uh the grill safety guidelines it’s something I can email out to anybody you can definitely email um my Department that’s FNS cire illinois.edu FNS Cod fire all onew illinois.edu that that brings me to I I do want to I do want to ask if somebody has questions
What are resources and we’ll have anything that’s mentioned any resources we can get we’ll put in the bio of this episode as always so if you’re listening you want to find out more you can go click on those links um and Mike’s already talked about the FNS uh link
There but are there any other resources for somebody who might have questions who’s like I don’t know if I’m if my smoke alarm is good or I don’t know if you know if there’s issues with with my my setup or I just have questions on
What I can do to be be more proactive are there ways to reach out I I think internally on campus I think especially talking the dorms and the frats and if they reach out to their uh housing uh you know Representatives um definitely get with them if they have any questions
Or or have any uh problems with anything to get maintained and fixed um I know champagne and Urbana fire departments we have an agreement with them we work well with them they do our building inspections and um I know they’re coordinating with housing all the time and uh and and we’re we’re doing
Trainings on on campus in that regard and doing some this education type stuff I think uh Robert may have some contacts you can definitely call the fire departments at any point I would I would believe yeah yeah um you want me to throw out contact stuff at this point or
We want throw a couple out yeah um so you asked about the resources so some of the statistics general safety guidelines the NFPA is a good resource they have a website just nfpa.org pretty much on any type of grilling safety seasonal safety recommendations there but the other part
Of that is to again if you’re going to use something look at the instruction manual check the safety precautions um things like that but NFPA is a very good one they have different languages on there too uh fact sheets things like that um if there ever is NFPA that’s the
National Fire Protection Association Association correct yep um and they make a lot of codes and standard too that we follow along with the International Code Council but that public resources is there things that are free um Mike mentioned reaching out to them their housing safety people if you’ve got a smoke alarm going
Off you don’t know what’s wrong with it maybe malfunctioning you’re worried about something with an appliance call the fire department will come out and check um so don’t ever be afraid when we install smoke alarms we have people worried I don’t want to tie them up with
This that’s what they’re there for um not just emergencies not Emer too um they’ll come out and check things to make sure uh the smoke alarm if they’ll monitor the environment make sure there is no issue with like carbon monoxide things like that but if you’ve got an
Alarm going off and don’t know what the cause is uh call and they’ll have a unit come by well and you know you said it because there there’s a feeling of I don’t want to call and be a nuisance I don’t want a problem I don’t want to you
Know false call or whatever that but I think I can speak for you to say that you would rather come out and check with me beforehand then have to come later and deal with a fire um that it’ be better for you to be proactive in that and obviously we’re not throwing out
There hey anytime you don’t know what to do about something called fire but if there is a concern with the safety device the the smoke alarm the fire alarm whatever it is yeah don’t be afraid to call and have somebody come check well guys I I really appreciate
Your time today I appreciate you taking the moment and sharing some uh some of your experience and your perspective um so I I just want to say thank you for being here yeah and Mike gave out their uh email address I said I’m from Champagne fire department uh my peer in
Urbana wasn’t with us today but if anybody champagne site or whatever has General fire safety questions um you can contact champagne fire department at 40372 uh my email address is robert. Simmons shampagne a.gov appreciate that thanks guys thank you appreciate no matter where you are and what you’re doing this summer uh
Fire safety is something that we’ve all heard of and uh we’ve all you know sometimes taken for granted but it’s important to be reminded of it’s important to hear uh things we can do and there’s always ways you can be proactive in that so if you have
Questions if you’re uncertain on your uh space or or your activities um please reach out uh you can reach out to us here at healthy Ali you can reach out to the fire departments in the area we reach out to campus um through FNS we’d be happy to to answer questions or put
You in contact with someone who can but thank you for joining us today you’re on a personal Journey no matter where you are in it you are important and you matter your health and wellness are important in matter and we’re here to keep you well to excel so go have a
Great week Alani let us know how you’re doing and we’ll catch you next time on healthy Al ey
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