Toronto Fire Services Promoting Home Safety at the CNE

This year, the fire station public safety display at the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) will be featuring in-the-flesh wisdom from retired firefighter John Gignac. The display, put on annually by the City of Toronto’s Fire Services is designed to raise awareness about the “silent killer” helping to prevent carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning.

With no smell, taste or colour, CO has robbed the lives of countless Canadians every year by going unnoticed. Families like Gignac’s niece: Laurie Hawkins, her husband Richard and two children, Cassandra and Jordan, fell victim in 2008 from a blocked chimney vent which forced the CO from their gas fireplace back into their home. Gignac since started the Hawkins-Gignac Foundation to honour them and ensure that their deaths were not in vain. As the official spokesperson for the charity, Gignac has overcome personal fears of flying in order to travel across Canadian communities to raise awareness and help prevent future tragedies.

As the summer months begin to wane, the importance of the cause becomes intensified, as carbon monoxide is produced when fuels typically used in heating sources (like natural gas, gasoline, oil, propane, wood or charcoal) are burned. Statistics Canada reported 380 accidental deaths between 2000-2009 as a result of CO poisoning, throughout the country in cities including Brampton, Toronto and Woodstock. While detectors are the most effective way to prevent injury, residents are advised to ensure their detectors are functioning and be aware that during emergencies like last year’s hydro outage where over 90,000 people were left without power in the Toronto area, electric detectors will not work.

Preventative measures include: keeping up with servicing and annual appliance maintenance by qualified technicians, installing battery-operated or back-up CO detectors and ensuring the batteries are charged, placing detectors outside sleeping areas and checking ventilators, making sure they are free from blockages. Symptoms of carbon monoxide exposure could be easily mistaken for flu symptoms because they include headaches, lethargy, shortness of breath and motor function impairment.

The foundation aims to educate people on these dangers as well as preventative measures and raise funds to purchase carbon monoxide alarms that are distributed to communities across the country. For more information, visit the display yourself on Friday, August 15 at 10:30 am at Fire Station 346 located at 90 Quebec St., Toronto.

All images via www.endthesilence.ca