Home Fire Escape Time Cut To Under Five Minutes

The time available to escape a home fire has been cut to under five minutes.

Livingston Fire Chief Rocky Dial said composite materials used to build homes now burn hotter and faster than real wood. Dial said the increase is not just how homes are built, but what people keep inside.

“Every house now has got telephones in them, computers in them, computer screens, all this plastic in there,” Dial said. “So once all that gets ignited it puts off a lot more dangerous smoke. A toxic smoke to the people inside.”

Dial said the way home rafters are constructed now pose a risk of collapsing when hangar plates get hot and come apart. Dial said people should be vigilant about checking smoke alarms, escape plans and sleeping with doors closed.

“Keep your bedroom doors closed at night,” Dial said. “To where if there is a fire, that bedroom door will give you a little extra time to escape out a window.”

Dial said there are ways to make escaping by window a safer option, if it is on the second floor.

“It’s called a fire escape ladder, it is actually a device that you build under your window,” Dial said. “So that you can actually throw it out the window and climb down from a two-story. They make them also that hook under the window. So once it’s raised it will hook over the sill of the window and you use that to climb down.”

Dial said escape plans should be practiced and emphasized to children in a home. He said two ways out and a meeting place need to be identified in case of a fire.