By Jeff Bobo
for the Times-News

Of the six residential fires that the Carters Valley Volunteer Fire Department responded to this past month, five didn’t have working smoke detectors.

The Tennessee Fire Marshal’s Office recently received a federal grant for 10,000 smoke detectors to be distributed to fire departments statewide for free distribution to the public.

On Monday, Carters Valley VFD Chief Mike Yates filed a request for 200 of those smoke detectors to be given away in the West Carters Valley area.

It might take as long as two weeks for those new smoke detectors to be delivered, however.

In light of the fatal fire that occurred in Bristol Saturday in which there was no smoke detector in the home — as well as the alarming number of Carters Valley fire calls recently to homes that don’t have smoke detectors — Yates purchased 10 smoke detectors from Lowe’s Monday.

The plan is to begin giving them away immediately in hopes of preventing another tragedy.

“We’re constantly emphasizing the importance of smoke detectors to the public, so we’re understandably alarmed when five out of six residential fire calls we answer are to residences with no working smoke detector,” Yates said. “Unfortunately, it sometimes takes a tragedy like they had in Bristol over the weekend to jog everyone’s memory. We don’t want to see anyone perish in a fire because they don’t have a smoke detector.

“If you can’t afford smoke detectors, call our department and we’ll bring you some. If you don’t know how to install them, we’ll help you.”

Read the full article on The Times-News site.

How is your department promoting smoke detector safety? Have you implemented a program that has reduced the amount of smoke detector related fatalities?