Your Home

1. Keep the exits from your home clear so that people can escape if there is a fire. Make sure that everyone in your home can easily find keys for doors and windows.
2. Take extra care in the kitchen – accidents while cooking account for over half of fires in homes. Never leave young children alone in the kitchen. 
3. Take extra care when cooking with hot oil. Consider buying a deep fat fryer which is controlled by a thermostat (if you don’t already have one).
4. Never leave lit candles in rooms that nobody is in or in rooms where children are on their own. Make sure candles are in secure holders on a surface that does not burn and far away from any materials that could burn.
5. Get into the habit of closing doors at night. If you want to keep a child’s bedroom door open, close the doors to the lounge and kitchen, it may well help save their life if there is a fire.
6. Don’t overload electrical sockets. Remember one plug for one socket.
7. Keep matches and lighters where children cannot see or reach them.
8. Take special care when you are tired or when you have been drinking.
9. Make sure you have working smoke alarms fitted in your home. There should be at least one smoke alarm upstairs and one downstairs in the hallway.
10. Remember to test your smoke alarms every week using the test button. Replace the batteries when necessary. Some smoke alarms have a 10- year life battery fitted. There is no need to change these batteries every year but at the end of 10 years the whole smoke alarm should be replaced.

Free fire safety check

In order to reduce death and injury caused by fire, the Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service has started upon a programme of Home Fire Safety Audits (HFSA’s).

Firefighters and community fire safety staff from the Service will now visit homes to give free home fire safety advice, and where appropriate install smoke alarms free of charge.

A home fire safety audit takes about an hour to complete and is generally undertaken by two fire service representatives.

You can request a free home fire safety audit for yourself or a dependant relative by contacting the service on 0870 6060699 and quote: Pembrokeshire.

A fire service representative will subsequently contact you to discuss your request.

Smoke alarms

If you are a Council tenant and your smoke alarm is broken/faulty you can ring building maintenance on 0800 085 6622 for it to be fixed or replaced.

Gas safety

If you can smell gas in your home:

• Open doors and windows to ventilate
• Check to see if the gas has been left on unlit or if a pilot light has gone out
• Turn off the gas at the meter
• Do not light any matches or lighters
• Do not operate door bells or electrical switches

Call TRANSCO on 0800 111999

Annual safety checks

The Council carries out free annual safety checks on gas, oil and solid fuel appliances. When you are given a date when the servicing is to be carried out it is important that you keep this appointment.

Kitchen fire safety - the basics

Every day over 20 people in the UK are killed or injured in kitchen fires.

Stop fire before it starts!

• Keep electrical leads, tea towels and clothes away from the cooker.
• Take care if you are wearing loose clothing, it can easily catch fire.
• Keep the oven, hob and grill clean. A build up of fat and grease catches fire easily.

Cooking safely

• Don’t leave pans unattended. Take them off the heat if you leave the room.
• Turn around saucepan handles so they DON’T stick out.
• When you’ve finished cooking, double check that the cooker or oven is turned OFF.

Deep fat frying

• Dry food before putting it into hot oil.
• If the oil starts to smoke – it’s TOO hot. Turn off the heat and let it cool.
• Use a thermostatically controlled electric deep fat fryer. They can’t overheat.

Take care late at night

It’s easy to be careless when you’re tired or if you’ve been drinking.

What if a pan catches fire?

If you do have a kitchen fire, don’t try to put it out.

• Shut the door, get everyone out of the house.
• Call the fire brigade and stay out until they arrive. Most of the injuries that happen in house fires are caused trying to put out a fire. 
• Never throw water on the fire

In an emergency always dial 999