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Friday, March 22, 2013

"Fire, Fire, Fire, Fire"

A few months back, I got a call at work from my mom, who was at home, and she said that the fire alarms had gone off three times so far that morning. Apparently when they decide to go off, they not only make that annoying and loud beeping noise, but there's also a woman's voice that starts saying "fire" over and over again.  Except she doesn't say it like you and I would normally. She really emphasizes the second syllable, so it's more like "fi-YER." Kind of funny, actually.  But anyways, the fire department came and checked everything out, and cleared the house, saying that there were no fire or carbon monoxide issues.

The fire alarms didn't go off again... until my dad got home from work a few hours later.  My dad did some investigating, and found that one of the smoke/carbon detectors seemed to be the one triggering the others, so he took it down, and that seemed to have stopped the problems.

I called our electrician and he came over and took a look at the system and realized that not all of the detectors were linked into the same electrical system, which is apparently required for insurance purposes.  Also, there were no detectors in any of the bedrooms, and some of them were battery operated.

We ended up scheduling a time for him to rewire the fire alarms, and add in new ones where they were needed, and we hadn't had any issues since then.

Until today.

"Fi-YER, Fi-YER, Fi-YER, Fi-YER."

I was at work once again, so my mom and my sister did some investigating, and there was one that was triggering the others again. They disconnected it from the ceiling and the others haven't triggered on again, so it looks like we have another culprit.  I'm going to have to buy a replacement at the hardware store this weekend to see if that solves some problems.

Has anyone else experienced anything like this?  Are we doing the right thing by unplugging the culprit? It just makes me nervous because it doesn't seem like those things should just go off without there being an issue, you know? Help!

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