Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
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Ed Yeates ReportingThough our valley inversion is still young, it's triggering carbon monoxide detectors inside homes. The Salt Lake City Fire Department has been getting calls over the past several days, but firefighters are telling us not to worry.
The little detectors sit idle all the time inside our houses. So when they do go off, as some are doing now, it's ALARMING. As of tonight, we've moved into a red air day, and as the inversion continues there's a sound in the smog.
We first reported on this quirk back in 1996. Some of the earlier model CO detectors were popping off all over the place during inversions. It still happens now, even with some of the new generation devices, especially where manufacturers choose to lean on the side of caution to make the detectors sensitive enough so they'll alarm before the problem becomes life-threatening.
Ryan Mellor, HASMAT Tech, Salt Lake City Fire Dept.: "The alarm will go off even though it's still at a safe level. But the alarm will go off telling you that your reading is higher than normal."
Higher than normal from background CO because the carbon monoxide outside in all this gunk is getting trapped.
Ryan Mellor: "I like the flag to be red, white and blue, but in the inversion I have to change the flag outside our station about once a month because it turns into red, gray and blue."
If you live in a home where the outside air might be getting inside...
Ryan Mellor: "Sometimes that will get into your house, and as it brushes by the home detector, it will set them off."
During inversions all the stuff - coming mostly from vehicles - becomes part of the trapped, stagnant pollution. Ryan Mellor gives us some dwindling oxygen levels just outside our truck's tailpipe.
Ryan Mellor: "Now we're at nineteen, eighteen, seventeen, five, two, one point three."
And this is just our tailpipe. Add thousands to it and you get the idea.
Ryan Mellor: "If you don't have to be outside, don't go outside. And if you can avoid driving to contribute to this, avoid driving to contribute to it."
Even though your alarm might go off and there's no danger, firefighters still want you to call. They would rather check it just to make sure something else isn't happening inside your house.
