Battery-backup emergency lighting

[MaryL]

Good point! I hadn't thought of that.

Thanks, MaryL

[Robert Gammon]

Which is a VERY good selling point for the battery backed wall unit that I pointed out to Mary. ONE fixture only, and no need to run around turning off units that are not needed.

[MaryL]

It also uses a 6-volt battery, and that is another good selling point (not an expensive, difficult-to-locate type of battery). I plan to order this one!

Thanks, again. MaryL

[MFF/R Thomas D. Horne]

Pete Have you ever hung from a second floor window and dropped? How did you do? I'm one of the people who's job it is to find and remove the folks who couldn't make it out on their own. Nothing is as easy or simple as you seem to think when you are woken out of a sound sleep at 0Dark30 in the blessed AM by the sound of a smoke detector and your coughing as soon as you sit up because there is already smoke in the house. I have found perfectly competent able bodied adults unconscious in there own front hall with their hand prints in the soot on the walls because they were suffering from carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide poisoning produced by a smoldering fire and could not find the door knob.

It is not unreasonable to want some sort of automatic light if you already know that you would have a hard time finding your way through your home in the dark. The less expensive units that others have already pointed out are a good choice especially in homes with children. The version I would recommend is more expensive because it is designed to work as a portable flood light after it is removed from its charging rack and it's battery will last until dawn the next day. That would be the streamlite litebox in the eight watt flood light lamp version. You can check those out at They are the third item down the page. There is a dealer locater link there to find someone who sells them in your area.

The only caution I would offer is to cover the basics first. Have both photoelectric and ionization smoke detectors on every level of your home and outside every group of bedrooms in your home. If you can afford it have the hard wired interconnected ones installed that also have a battery back up. If you can afford more then consider a complete automatic home fire alarm system. Such systems can be equipped with carbon monoxide, natural gas, and even refrigeration failure and flooding detectors. If you are having a home built for you then have an automatic sprinkler system installed. That option will cost you less, when installed during the construction of a new home, then a good grade of wall to wall carpeting.

Under the deregulation mantra the nations public utilities are becoming more brittle. To maintain profitability the staffing of repair crews have been cut to dangerous levels. We can expect more outages and failures as these utilities management passes from engineers who understood their product and customers to MBAs that understand only the Andrew Carnegie formula of "Take care of cost and profit takes care of itself."

Master Firefighter / Rescuer Thomas D. Horne speaking only for himself

[Member, Takoma Park Volunteer]

Mary The one he's talking about comes on automatically when the power to it's charging rack fails. When you remove it from it's charging rack it will function as a very long lasting flashlight. In my opinion the model you want is the eight watt, flood light bulb, power failure version. It is the third item down that page.

[MaryL]

Thanks. I did not pick up on that when I first looked at the page. (Also, thanks for your informative reply to one of Pete C's messages. He seems to think I am stupid for wanting more protection, while I think we should consider panic and the limited time available in the event of a fire -- and take extra precautions for that possibility.)

MaryL

[MFF/R Thomas D. Horne]

Mary I salute you for taking the time to think about taking care of your own safety instead of sitting back and assuming someone else will magically bale you out when things go wrong.

A major portion of a Firefighters job is to encourage people to think about such issues in advance. I give you major points for having taken some preparatory steps and reevaluating how they work out when appropriate. Many of the deaths that occur during emergencies and disasters can be attributed to lack of preparedness on the part of individual citizens who then want heads to roll because a federal Urban Search and Rescue Team (USART) did not arrive during the event to hold them by the hand and spoon feed them. If more people were taking responsibility for there own safety like you the fire and rescue service would be a lot less busy then it now is and the US would not have the worst rate of civilian fire casualties of all developed nations.