Had 4 CO detectors going off last night!

Let me start by putting this up...

I am chalking this one up for a learning experience and I am posting for the benefit of others here so they don't repeat my stupid act. Hope it helps.

I had 4 different CO detectors going off last night!

I have a basement install.

Started a fire around 4pm. Prepped the fire box by removing the excess ash/coals as they were just getting to be too deep. Shoveled them into the ash kettle and set it aside (on concrete floor)

Had a nice fire going for several hours. It ran it's course and turned to large coals/embers by around 11pm.

Was upstairs on the PC when I here BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP downstairs. I go down to find the one VERY old CO detector going off. This is one I had just left plugged in near where the old oil burner was. I knew it was "expired" but kept it anyway just because. I have 3 NEW ones in the house.

I checked the fire. Looked good. Since we have four CO detectors in the house and only the old one was yelling at me I figured it was just emitting a "signal of expiration". So I unplugged it and took it upstairs to examine it. It is 21 years old.

As I get upstairs I hear another BEEP BEEP BEEP! downstairs.

Now my brain shifts gear completely. I go straight to the basement door, open it, open the window nearest the stove. I start to seriously ponder what the source may be. Naturally I am concentrating on the stove.

I reset the detector and continue the search. It goes off again and then another one at the TOP of the stairs goes off. I now open all windows in the house and the doors.

As I am standing near the stove I figure while I have the basement door open I may as well take out the ash kettle and dump it since it was really raining hard out anyway.

I grab the ash bucket and darn near burn my hand it is so hot. Well, now I am both relieved and very much wanting to kick myself in the "ASH."

The source.

I then set the can outside and leave the house open.

As I go upstairs again a 4th CO detector goes off down the hall near the bedrooms.


I am still amazed and surprised that the little bit of embers that I picked up in the shovel smoldered for hours and caused 4 alarms to go off. Thankfully the CO detectors did their job. I REALLY LEARNED a lesson last night. Hope this helps someone.



WOW. I had an unsettling night.
Not to mention when I went outside to dump the ashes later I was chased by a skunk.

DougA said:

The first thing you should do when a CO detector goes off is open all the windows and doors. - you could pass out & die trying to find out what is happening. I'll let Jake answer better than this.

BTW, are you sure those are CO and not smoke detectors???

Click to expand...

We have 3 smoke detectors and 4 CO detectors in our 900 square ft house.
The smokies we have are round, the CO's we have are rectangular.

The ash kettle was NOT smoking at all. It is "telling" that the smoke detectors did not even make a chirp.

There was NO odor at all in the house.

I would think any ash can with a lid would need to be air tight. I can't imagine any metal cans with air tight lids though.

Coals and embers in a can (even with a lid) can still smolder I believe.

As for me, I WILL be taking all ash outside IMMEDIATELY hence forward.

Dieselhead said:

IF your going to call the fire dept to come out and meter your house, please evacuate and leave windows and doors closed! If it's all vented out when arriving there will be no way to tell if there was co in the house or it's just a bad detector.

Click to expand...

Good point.

That does make sense if there is only ONE detector in play.

In my case, there were 4.

Rossco said:

Lesson Lernt I guess.

So I get a phone call at 02:30am the other night, (Am at work) its the wife "CO alarm going off in the house, what should I do?" Kiddie integrated system with Voice alert.

Get the kids out, phone 911! she opened a few windows and the back door then went to the neighbour's house....


.....Fire department said levels were 7ppm upper level and 25ppm lower. The wife evacuated the consentrate by simply opening the house up. Alarm should trigger @ 30ppm after a pre set exposure duration.
s

Click to expand...

Thankfully all was good with your family! Since your wife opened the windows B4 the dept got there, I wonder what the measurements would have been if she had not opened them?
Obviously higher.
Scary.

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My detectors are the kind without any digital readout. (we used to have one years ago) So I do not know what the ppm was in my house from the ash can, but I do know that the CO managed to make it ALL threw the house from the basement. (just as BrotherBart stated it does).

I am thinking to buy a digital one to add to the collection.