Blog: Sounding an Alarm on Smoke Alarms

Posted by: Anthony Green at Mar 07, 2012 12:00 AM CST

Keywords: Education

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Smoke alarms save lives Fasten your seat belts: this is going to be a sad story. Edward Cantrell was a Green Beret who received four Bronze Stars and one Purple Heart. He just recently returned home from Afghanistan to his wife and two girls, 6-year-old Isabella and 4-year-old Natalia. They lived in Hope Mills, N.C.

Early Tuesday, the Cantrell home burst into flames. Edward and his wife Louise escaped from the fire, but Chief Warrant Officer Cantrell wrapped a blanket around himself and went back into the house to try to rescue Isabella and Natalia. He never made it back out, and he and the two girls perished in the fire. Louise survived. They were dead before the fire departments were even able to get there. Read more and watch a video.

We take it for granted that all of us have smoke alarms in our homes, but it’s just not the case, even today. I spoke to the Cotton Volunteer Fire Department and the fire is still under investigation. But there are strong indications that there was no working smoke alarm in the Cantrell home.
Think about the Cantrell family when you get home at night and do a survey: Do we have smoke alarms? Do they work? Are the batteries good? Might we consider getting smoke alarms with long life batteries?

This is heartbreaking, but stories like this make us think. If we do and lives in the future can be saved because of our Cantrell family smoke alarm audit, then this is a fitting memory of the lives of Edward, Isabella and Natalia.

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Comment on this Blog Post:

Posted by anika tsimberg at: March 8, 2012

I thought the alarms chirped when they needed batteries? Anyway, I had a Kidde alarm near my kitchen and when I burnt something and filled the kitchen, living room, play room with smoke, it NEVER alarmed. I called the company and they told me it can tell what kind of smoke and won't alarm for that smoke. Ok so if I left my stove on before I went to bed, I'm a gonner!!!!! needless to say the company sent me a replacement and asked me to return mine for an investigation which they have yet to follow up!! I don't trust their equipment!!