Carbon monoxide detectors now mandatory in every household
Monday, February 22, 2010
by Russell Maitland
Governor David A. Paterson signed a bill into law, effective today, February 22, 2010, mandating that all residents within New York State have working Carbon Monoxide detectors. Known as “Amanda’s Law,” after a 16-year-old girl who died one year ago at a sleepover in the basement of a friend’s house, this law “will prevent future tragedies like the one that took Amanda Hansen’s life far too soon,” Governor Paterson said. “This legislation will create safer homes for New Yorkers.” The Chappaqua Fire Department reminds all residents to comply with the new law. Install these devices and regularly check to make sure they are working.
A carbon monoxide detector senses the production of potentially lethal carbon monoxide by gas fireplaces, gas stoves, barbecues, gas or oil furnaces and hot water heaters. Because carbon monoxide is heavier than air, it sinks. At a minimum, detectors should be plugged into an electrical outlet at ground level on all sleeping floors. Detectors on non-sleeping floors are recommended to be placed chest high. Carbon Monoxide detectors only last five years and then need to be replaced. Carbon Monoxide is odorless and colorless and can’t be detected without a working detector and is often referred to as the silent killer. Please don’t become a statistic.
Amanda’s LawStandards for installation of carbon monoxide detectors requiring that every one or two-family dwelling, or any dwelling accommodation located in a building owned as a condominium or cooperative in the state , or any multiple dwellings shall have installed an operable carbon monoxide detector of such manufacture, design and installation standards as are established by the council. Carbon monoxide detectors required by this section are required only where the dwelling unit has appliances, devices or systems that may emit carbon monoxide or has an attached garage. For purposes of this subdivision, multiple dwelling means a dwelling which is either rented, leased, let or hired out, to be occupied, or is occupied as the temporary or permanent residence or home of three or more families living independently of each other, including but not limited to the following: a tenement, flat house, maisonette apartment, apartment house, apartment hotel, tourist house, bachelor apartment, studio apartment, duplex apartment, kitchenette apartment, hotel, lodging house, rooming house, boarding house, boarding and nursery school, furnished room house, club, sorority house, fraternity house, college and school dormitory, convalescent, old age or nursing homes or residences. It shall also include a dwelling, two or more stories in height, and with five or more boarders, roomers or lodgers residing with any one family. New construction shall mean a new facility or a separate building added to an existing facility.
Russell Maitland is chief of the Chappaqua Fire Department.
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