How To Escape A Fire: Denver Firefighters Share Life Saving Lessons
By Alan Gionet
DENVER (CBS4) There's a troubling trend in metro area fires this year, people jumping out of windows.
"What we've experienced probably in the past six or eight months is several fires in which people decided to self-extricate themselves out of a bedroom window, out of a bathroom window," said Denver Fire Assistant Chief Ryan Nuanes.
Fires like one on North Federal in which people jumped from upper windows and even threw a baby down to people below.
"What we've found, is that they take what is an option, but usually the worst option of jumping out of a window first."
Denver Fire set up a demonstration at their fire training facility. The smoke was not real, but theatrical smoke, but the demonstration was clear.
"The first thing that they do is they panic. And they open a door and they're met with heat and smoke and fire. And the first thing they want to do is get away from it. Human instinct, natural reaction," said Nuanes. "They hear other people screaming, they hear maybe the sound of the fire, the crackling of the fire. And the first thing they do is open the door and see what's going on."
The problem is, they leave the door open. Then, the smoke moves in. The room fills with smoke rapidly. Soon after, the fire follows.
"The smoke is toxic and it's going to create a situation for you that's going to make it hard to breathe and it's going to increase your panic." Nuanes said.
Then people head for the windows. Soon, with the fire and smoke moving in, people jump.
"I understand that there's a situation, that there's a time and place that your apartment is on fire and you can do nothing more but jump out of the window. Buy yourself some time before that that should be the last option, not the first option."
Here's what you should do, say firefighters.
"You want to use the back of your hand. That's how firefighters do it. The reason that we do that is if the door is hot, we don't want to burn the palm of our hands," said Nuanes. "Then, open the door and look. If there's no way out, close it. Then, put something underneath the door," said Nuanes.
He suggests wet towels. If you can't wet them right away, just put them there, then try and wet them. If you can't, the towels will help even if dry. Now you've bought yourself minutes. You can go to the window.
"Instead of maybe knocking this window out, trying to use something to knock this window out, try to open it. The reason that we say that is because if you knock this window out, you can't close it," said Nuanes.
Then if you need help, call out or waive something. With those extra minutes, you give firefighters time to get to you and response times mean they'll be there soon.
Alan Gionet is anchor of the CBS4 Morning News and reports on a wide variety of issues and "Good Question" stories. He started at CBS4 in 1994. Follow Alan on Twitter @AlanGTV.
