Project focused on making homes fire-safe

WASILLA -- So one day you get home from work, you're tired, it's been a long day, you sit down in your favorite recliner and light up a cigarette. But you fall asleep sitting there and the cigarette falls out of your hand into a pile of blankets on the floor. The house burns down and you die.

Or you're cooking, something on the grill or in the oven, and you just walk away from it when the phone rings or forget about it altogether. And then your house catches fire and burns down.

Cigarettes and kitchen fires are the leading causes of fire fatalities and home fires, said Jodie Hettrick, public education coordinator for the Alaska State Fire Marshal in Anchorage. Hettrick last week taught firefighters and public safety officers from across the state how to implement the Alaska Home Fire Safety Survey Project, at a meeting in the Central Mat-Su Public Safety Building in Wasilla.

The project, made possible in part with a grant of $413,000 from the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Assistance to Firefighters Program, trains firefighters to implement the survey, which will include 1,500 homes throughout Alaska.

The meetings last week in Wasilla were meant to "train the trainers," Hettrick said. Safety officers will go back to their communities and teach their own fire departments how to do home fire safety surveys. One hundred homes will be selected from each of the 15 participating communities across the state to receive a home fire safety survey.

Surveys include the installation of smoke alarms, carbon monoxide detectors, fire extinguishers, home fire escape ladders, kitchen timers, surge protectors and further training on how to make homes more fire-safe. Hettrick said the equipment should be distributed by Sept. 15 and seminars for families receiving equipment will be held sometime in September.

After four months firefighters will go back and check to ensure the equipment is in working order and answer any questions homeowners may have. By tracking the statistics from the participating homes, fire officials hope to determine if the equipment and education reduce fire fatalities.

"This [equipment] should be a standard requirement in every home," Hettrick said, "The average home is not adequately protected from fire."

Last week at the Central Mat-Su Public Safety Building in Wasilla, fire and rescue workers from as far away as St. Paul and Ketchikan gathered to participate in the training with firefighters from Mat-Su and Big Lake.

Wasilla is one of the 15 communities from across the state that is participating in the survey. Communities were selected to participate in the survey if they met a number of requirements, one of which was if they had two or more fire fatalities in the last 10 years. Such fatalities, Hettrick said, can and should be prevented.

"Every house fire is preventable," Hettrick said. "There are simple things, minimal stuff that if people learned, they could prevent fires in their homes."