Headaches and nausea? Be careful...

[Cat]

Had a country friend on FaceBook talking about headaches and nausea - she thought maybe she was catching the flu in this bad weather.

 

Turned out their furnace was belching out Carbon Monoxide into the house. Thank God they caught it in time and are getting the furnace fixed, and the house aired out.

 

Be careful, friends...

 

 

 

[CrabGrassAcres]

Any house with propane or Natural gas should have CO detectors!!!

I heat with electric, but have propane for backup. Haven't had to use it yet.

[The WE2's]

We have both kinds of detectors in our home. Also have both types in mom's apartment and son's apartment. Had a friend that nearly died from carbon monoxide poisoning. Even after an emergency room visit to diagnose the problem and got the furnace fixed & house aired out, had to have friends come by and check in on him (he's single). It took him months to regain his strength. We've been a bit lax this year in not having our furnace cleaned & checked like we normally do, because of finances. Normally we don't just rely on detectors, we try to keep our furnace well maintained each year to keep us safe and to keep our furnace's performance as good as it can be.

[Cat]

Our furnace shuts down if the air flow is disrupted, so we have that "safety".

 

But DH was dismayed this weekend to realize that it's now 10 years old. My, how time flies!

[Mt_Rider]

Oddly, in this ancient rental log cabin, we have a furnace that is just in it's second season. I assume..?...assume that means it's got all the safety bells and whistles. But rental law in CO requires smoke detectors and the 'daddy law' in our clan requires we have the CO detectors. He bought us one and installed it! Durned thing went off more than once too!

 

Our cabin sits on a half-buried into hillside basement. Basement is supposed to be garage but with the addition of the original furnace back in history, putting a vehicle in there would be suicide. [just one more point I plan to make to any new renters if we move out] The furnace intake is supposed to be from upstairs. But it sure does intake from the basement too. It sucks the exhaust up from a vehicle left running [to warm up in winter] if it's parked right outside the closed big garage door. Can you IMAGINE the danger if we'd have been parking cars in the garage? Sheeeeesh!

 

 

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Another warning that should be old news to most people......NEVER, NEVER NEVER burn charcoal grill inside even if you're freezing. Unless you're choosing to die quicker from the gases than slower by hypothermia. It is deadly toxic.

 

Burning ANY open flame...even a bunch of candles....will require at least a bit of ventilation to replace the oxygen that the burning has used up. .....course if your ancient log cabin already has that ventilation naturally, ya prolly don't need to worry so much. BUT burning charcoal is because it is toxic....not merely needing ventilation. NEVER indoors!!!!!

 

IF you get caught in snowstorm and stuck in your vehicle, turn your engine on for 10-15 min. per hour to use the heater. BE VERY SURE that your tailpipe has not become buried in snow. Clear it before running the engine!!! Same type of poisoning. If you use an emergency candle to warm the vehicle's interior (yes, it does help), crack the window a tiny bit....unless you're getting in and out to clear the tailpipe. Then you're probably refreshing the oxygen levels ....and dissipating any heat, unfortunately. Do stationary calisthenics to warm your body. Keep toes, fingers tucked into warmer places on the body. Put up the insulated, silver sun shades on windows. Carry extra in winter for this purpose to cover more windows....lose a lot of heat out the glass.

 

 

MtRider ....daily service announcement.... Stay safe.