Carbon Monoxide: Three dead in South Providence

Dave Yates (GrandPAH)_8

Tim,

Last year, a row home exploded taking with it four other row homes and our customer's business, which was an unattached three-story brick building. The blast shifted our customer's building off of its foundation, so it had to be demolished.

The row home that exploded was vacant. The landlord & his helper had been there working on a furnace earlier. A disgruntled tenant had broken in and vandalized the property too.

The fire dept wanted to investigate the cause and retained us for the job. Soon as they could remove enough rubble to give us access to the basement, we were to visit the site and check for signs of equipment malfunction or if we could assist in determining the origin of the blast.

Before that could happen, a high-muck approved a complete site clean-up and before the fire dept knew it, all evidence was gone & the basements filled in with dirt!

That boiler should have remained on site and been fully tested before removal. JMHO

gasfolk

Three dead in South Providence

A boiler recently had been installed in the single-family house«/a>

Personally, I really appreciate The Wall (and Mark Hunt) convincing us how dangerous this stuff can be.

gf

gasfolk

Three dead in South Providence

A boiler recently had been installed in the single-family house«/a>

Personally, I really appreciate The Wall (and Mark Hunt) convincing us how dangerous this stuff can be.

gf

gasfolk

Three dead in South Providence

A boiler recently had been installed in the single-family house

Personally, I really appreciate The Wall (and Mark Hunt) convincing us how dangerous this stuff can be.

gf

gasfolk

Around Town...

A boiler recently had been installed in the single-family house

To The Wall and Mark Hunt: Thanks for spreading the word how dangerous this stuff can be.

gf

gasfolk

Amateurs Beware...

A boiler recently had been installed in the single-family house

To The Wall (and Mark Hunt): Thanks for spreading the word. This stuff is dangerous.

gf

Mark Hunt_3

Sad


and so preventable.

The first line of defense against CO poisoning is not a CO alarm.

It is a trained professional.

Mark H

Saggs

Poor Souls... If someone has further info on this I'd like to see it posted here. We can all learn somthing from it.

Larry (from OSHA)

And more

There was another one in St. Paul yesterday. A young man sleeping in a basement bedroom near a boiler that apparently hadn't been serviced for a long time.

http://www.startribune.com/local/stpaul/13502296.html

Larry

John R. Hall

Getting repititious

This bullsh*t keeps going on and on and on ad nauseum. I get the alerts every day and sadly, none of this stuff is suprising. I guess I've become numb to ignorance.

Larry (from OSHA)

a different approach

how many happen in Germany or anywhere else in Europe? I don't know, but I'm guessing fewer. Mandated inspections etc. may have some benefits, but in our culture of resisting more regulation in our lives, the type of legislation that will continue to occur will be requirements for CO detectors of the current flavor placed in residences. That might do some good, but we all know that there are some issues with that as well. There is certainly room for improvement on all fronts.

Larry

Mark Hunt_3

I've gotten


stories from all over the world. I am 99% sure that I posted a story from England about a landlord that was sentenced to a prison term for failing to maintain a heating appliance that produced CO and killed a family.

One from China, not a heating appliance, several children killed at a day care center when an employee of the center placed a generator in an adjoining room for power during an outage.

Mark H

Unknown

This is in my area

I will be talking to my contact at the gas company tomorrow and find out what took place.

Edward A. (Ed) Carey_3

NFPA Monthly News Letter

I am sure that many of you are also members of NFPA, and receive the Members-Exclusive monthly news letter.

If you do not, the following is the first paragraph at the top of this month’s newsletter. The next line was also the very next line in that order, in the same news letter.


"Carbon monoxide incidents jump 18 percent
U.S. fire departments responded to an average of seven calls per hour for non-fire carbon monoxide incidents in 2005. Learn to protect your family from CO, and how an NFPA technical committee is expanding NFPA 720 to make all occupancies safer".

"Fire service: Teach your community about preventing home-heating fires. "


Hits home, doesn't it??


Ed Carey

TK03

I have been preaching the last three years or so in my seminars we need better CO detectors. The junk that meets the standards are not enough(70ppm). People with heart problems, asthma and smokers and the very young should not be in more than 25 ppm. The junk from the big box stores and everywhere else (which do meet standards) do not peotect us fine americans.

gasfolk

From today's paper...

No licensed plumber could have done the installation “because it is so wrong,” said police Maj. Stephen Campbell. For the time being, however, the police have refused to divulge how the installation was flawed or to answer certain other specific questions about the heating system.

http://www.projo.com/news/content/Death_Folo_01-09-08_458HQ0N_v27.287d59c.html

gf

Jim Davis_3

Manslaughter-Homocide Investigation

Finally this is being treated as a crime. Doesn't matter if harm wasn't intended. Duh!! Article said the installation was so bad it couldn't be a licensed contractor. For sure!! If the guy wasn't licensed wouldn't the supplier of the boiler be liable for providing boiler to such an individual?

Wasn't it nice that they did an autopsy(necropsy) on the pet rabbit!

Unknown

Jim, the problem here in Rhode Island

is that you can purchase a boiler without a license or a permit in some places.

Everyone I talk to is being very closed mouth about this. My sources are sworn to secrecy about just exactly what happened.This happens all the time. Instead of talking about what they find it becomes a closed investigation and no body learns anthing.

How about this they are going to remove the boiler and water heater so they can see what is wrong with them. Somebody better get in their who knows what they are doing.

This I do know the lead investigator from the utility is from Public Relations. What do you think they know about boilers?

Robert O'Connor_12

yet another tragedy

Not CO but worse!

So sad.



http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b8e_1199991218&p=1



Robert O'Connor/NJ

Jim Davis_3

Boiler removed by police on this job

Now how is anyone going to prove that is was the installation that caused the problem. Said they needed it for fingerprints. Can't CSI do that on the site???

ALH_4

Failed Thermostat

This story is a tragedy, but certainly the cause for this tragedy was more than a failed thermostat. If the thermostat sticks on, the room will get too hot but the heating system should not explode. Also their assertion that thermostats are only good for 5 years is ridiculous.

Unknown

Better yet!

They took all of the related components including the expansion tank and water heater. By the way, the paper this morning stated that this was a used Enerjet that was installed in this house just before New Years. The oldest son is in the Navy and was having trouble reaching the family so he contacted a neighbor who in turn called the police.

Where this will help is in tracking down the person that installed it. Since it isn't a new boiler they will not be able to trace it to a particular distributor or installer. The finger prints on the newer components will be their only key to who the culprit is. They are in fact taking this one very seriously and probably will be handling it as a Negligent Homicide type case much like the Nightclub Fire we had here a few years ago that killed 100 people. Those folks only got 4 year sentences though and are eligible for Parole after 16 months.

Glenn Stanton

Manager of Technical Development

Burnham Hydronics

U.S. Boiler Co., Inc.

Abro

Suspect turned himself in...

http://www.projo.com/news/content/Monoxide_Probe_01-12-08_9P8JBTM_v11.2517024.html

gasfolk

The national CO experience...

Prompted by this incident, the local paper has printed these remarkable statistics:

'The Silent Killer'

Excerpt: "In 2005 alone, U.S. fire departments responded to more than 61,100 calls in which higher-than-normal levels of the gas were found, according to the National Fire Protection Association....The Centers for Disease Control estimates that about 480 people died annually between 2002 and 2004 from carbon-monoxide exposure. The gas poisons about 1,500 people a year."

http://www.projo.com/news/content/carbon_monoxide_01-11-08_4T8IP71_v29.2a30d99.html

gasfolk

The National CO Experience

Prompted by this incident, the local paper has printed these remarkable statistics:

'The Silent Killer'

Excerpt: "In 2005 alone, U.S. fire departments responded to more than 61,100 calls in which higher-than-normal levels of the gas were found, according to the National Fire Protection Association....The Centers for Disease Control estimates that about 480 people died annually between 2002 and 2004 from carbon-monoxide exposure. The gas poisons about 1,500 people a year."

http://www.projo.com/news/content/carbon_monoxide_01-11-08_4T8IP71_v29.2a30d99.html

gf