Ireland Army Community Hospital

Every home should have at least one working smoke alarm and most states have laws requiring them in residential dwellings. Homes with working smoke alarms usually have a death rate 40-50% less than the rate for homes without smoke alarms.

Some smoke detector tips are:

Smoke alarms should be placed on every floor of the house and outside each sleeping area. If you sleep with the door closed, install smoke alarm inside the room.
Smoke alarms should not be installed near a window, door, or forced-air register where drafts could interfere with their operation.
Test smoke alarms at least once a month and clean the units in accordance with manufacture instructions.
Install new batteries in all smoke at least once a year or upon moving into a new home unless the detector is equipped with a long life (ten year) battery.
Never borrow a battery from a smoke detector.
While smoke alarms alert people to fires, families still need to develop and practice home fire escape plans so that they can get out quickly!

Sources of information:

The U.S. Fire Administration
National Fire Incident Reporting System
The National Fire Protection Association

Safety First

Booze, drugs, driving don’t mix

Presented By: Armor Center Safety Office

The following information was obtained from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes kill someone every 31 minutes and non-fatally injure someone every two minutes.

During 2005, 16,885 people in the U.S. died in alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes, representing 39% of all traffic-related deaths.

In 2005, nearly 1.4 million drivers were arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. That’s less than one percent of the 159 million self-reported episodes of alcohol-impaired driving among U.S. adults each year.

Drugs other than alcohol (e.g., marijuana and cocaine) are involved in about 18% of motor vehicle driver deaths. These other drugs are generally used in combination with alcohol.

More than half of the 414 child passengers ages 14 and younger who died in alcohol-related crashes during 2005 were riding with the drinking driver.

In 2005, 48 children age 14 years and younger who were killed as pedestrians or pedal cyclists were struck by impaired drivers.

Each year, alcohol-related crashes in the United States cost about $51 billion.

Male drivers involved in fatal motor vehicle crashes are almost twice as likely as female drivers to be intoxicated with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.08% or greater. It is illegal to drive with a BAC of 0.08% or higher in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

At all levels of blood alcohol concentration, the risk of being involved in a crash is greater for young people than for older people. In 2005, 16 percent of drivers ages 16 to 20 who died in motor vehicle crashes had been drinking alcohol.

Young men ages 18 to 20 (under the legal drinking age) reported driving while impaired more frequently than any other age group.

Among motorcycle drivers killed in fatal crashes, 30 percent have BACs of 0.08 percent or greater.

Nearly half of the alcohol-impaired motorcyclists killed each year are age 40 or older, and motorcyclists ages 40 to 44 years have the highest percentage of fatalities with BACs of 0.08 percent or greater.

Of the 1,946 traffic fatalities among children ages 0 to 14 years in 2005, 21 percent involved alcohol.

Among drivers involved in fatal crashes, those with BAC levels of 0.08 percent or higher were nine times more likely to have a prior conviction for driving while impaired than were drivers who had not consumed alcohol.