Protecting Your Home from Holiday Fires
With the holidays quickly approaching, you may find yourself having an increase in gatherings, cooking, and time spent indoors. Because your home is an essential part of your life, being cautious and vigilant for any fire dangers is a significant factor in protecting your home from holiday fires. Holiday fire safety is just one part of protecting your home; however, adopting some principles from our guide into your everyday life could be an opportunity to make your home a safer place all year round.
Home Fire Protection Considerations
Your home provides shelter for your family, pets, and possessions and is worth protecting from fires. During the holiday season, you may be looking to build up your home’s fire protection. While considering your home’s fire protection, there are a few things you may want to keep in mind, like the size of your residence, budget, and home safety requirements. You may also want to consider the risks you have in your home, including electrical systems, appliances, heating systems, and more, to get an idea of what hazards are in your home and where to begin preparing for holiday fire protection.
A Guide to Kitchen Fire Safety This Holiday Season
Holiday celebrations may start in the kitchen with delicious appetizers, main courses, and delightful desserts. With so many options for food creation come many opportunities for kitchen fires. According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), from 2017 to 2021, cooking accounted for 44 percent of all reported home fires in the U.S. and was the leading cause of reported home fires and home fire injuries.
Reducing your risk of a fire caused by cooking can include being vigilant and removing flammable items from your heated appliances, such as fabrics (like kitchen towels), food packaging, and oils. Remembering to turn off your range and oven and never leaving your cooking unattended are important kitchen safety procedures as well. Having a fire extinguisher in an accessible area in your kitchen is a simple and fairly inexpensive way to increase your fire protection. Your kitchen’s fire safety is invaluable throughout the year; however, with gatherings, it may be worth considering implementing comprehensive safety precautions.
Hazards Aren’t Just in the Kitchen
Aside from your kitchen fire safety, it may also be worth further considering more general holiday fire hazards. No matter what your holiday decor entails, we have compiled some quick tips for potentially reducing your risk of a fire this holiday season:
- If you opt for fresh garland or a fresh Christmas tree, it is incredibly important to keep your tree watered and healthy and all of your greenery away from any fireplaces or flames like candles. Dry pine trees can ignite and become engulfed in flames in under a minute, according to this publication by PBS.
- Make sure any lights you use, or plugin are in proper working order. Do not use lights in outlets that cannot accommodate their wattage or cords, as well as lights that have frayed or stripped cords or broken or missing bulbs.
- It is important to never leave candles unattended or burning for too long.
- Fireplaces should be extinguished properly after each use and never left alone or unattended.
- If you use a portable heat source like space heaters, make sure they are turned off and unplugged after each use. Refer to your owner’s manual for more safety tips and appliance use procedures.
Finding Your Residential Fire Sprinkler System
As you look forward to gathering with your loved ones, beginning to upgrade, install, or maintain your residential fire sprinkler system can be a fantastic approach to aiming to protect your home this holiday season. Western States Fire Protection is proud to offer services in retrofitting and installing systems for existing and new construction homes. WSFP residential systems are smaller and more inconspicuous than commercial-grade sprinkler systems and are also available in color options to be more aesthetically pleasing in your home. With so many benefits to whole home fire protection systems, now is the time to contact us to learn about how WSFP can help protect your home this holiday season!