This weekend, households across the country will take the time to change their clocks by setting them an hour back. At the same time, take the important step to also change the batteries on smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors throughout your house. Testing and changing the batteries on these devices is a simple, life-saving habit that could make all the difference when trying to escape safely during a fire. To help give more families those critical seconds, Energizer is donating a quarter of a million batteries this fall to fire departments across the country to distribute to families in their communities.
For 27 years, Energizer® has partnered with the International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) to keep families safe through the Change Your Clock Change Your Battery® program (CYCCYB). Energizer® and the IAFC work tirelessly to remind people of the simple, life-saving habit of changing and testing the batteries in smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors when setting the clocks back for daylight saving time.
Home fires take the lives of more than 2,500 people each year in the United States alone. On average, seven people are killed in home fires every day. But an absence of smoke alarms in homes isn’t the problem. Most homes have smoke alarms now but a lot of them don’t have fresh batteries. 71 percent of smoke alarms that failed to operate had missing, disconnected or dead batteries, and according to the National Fire Protection Association, three out of five fatal fire injuries take place in homes without working smoke alarms. Yikes – so scary. I admit to disconnecting my smoke alarm if it goes off while I’m cooking, something that is definitely not safe and I shouldn’t do.
Home Fire Safety Plan
Energizer research has revealed that more than 70 percent of individuals think their family would have enough time to evacuate in the event of a fire, and 30 percent say they or their family can detect a fire. The reality is home fires don’t give families much time to escape and are not always easy to detect. In fact, while only 20 percent of reported home fires occurred between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., overnight fires caused half of all home fire deaths.
It’s scary but until this month, we didn’t have a plan if there was a fire in our house. Luckily, my son learned a lot at school in honor of it being National Fire Prevention Month and we now have a plan in place. The NFPA is a great resource in helping to plan an escape for your household. But your first step in making a plan can be to change the batteries in your smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors this weekend!
Energizer Cares About Your Safety
The Change Your Clock Change Your Battery program is just one of the ways Energizer brings to life the company’s commitment to power safety and responsibility, while making a positive impact in communities across the country. For more information on the program, including a full list of dates and locations the Fire Safety Awareness events, and to download fire safety materials, please visit energizer.com/cyccyb.
Win It!
Enter the form below to win a gift basket from Energizer that includes a Smoke Detector, 2 pack 9V Energizer® batteries, 12-inch Energizer® Bunny, Energizer® foam bunny ears, Coloring Book, Journal and Pen.
Disclosure: I was compensated for this post on behalf of The Motherhood for Energizer. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
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Thank you for the reminder! I never remember to change of batteries until the middle of the night chirp.
I totally forgot about time falling back this weekend. Definitely will be changing those batteries. Thanks for the reminder.
What a great initiative that is so important to share! We have a family emergency plan because we live in LA and have been through a few earthquakes. I don’t think we are diligent about changing batteries in alarms until they start beeping and I love the idea of making that a habit with every change in time. Thanks for sharing!
If I were better about changing the batteries when we change our clocks, I probably wouldn’t be woken up in the middle of the night by the annoying chirping! This weekend I’m going to do it!
Thanks for the reminder! It seems like I only remember every other year!
Thank you for this reminder. I need to do the ones in our carbon monoxide detector. Our smoke detectors are hardwired…although I don’t know what happens if we are in need of a backup!
My kids came home this week after a fire safety talk and wanted to know our plan, I could not believe we had never discussed one before, mom fail! Thanks for reminding me to change my batteries with the time change.
Thanks for the reminder to change our batteries this weekend. I am very diligent about making sure they work, and thankfully our shower sets them off occasionally from the steam so we know they work!
I think my lil guys are old enough to understand a plan. We should work on putting one in place.
Though I am not a fan of the time change, I do love the reminder to replace, check and upgrade things around the home. Thank you for the reminder.
Usually I would say, yes, we are changing them! But it’s opening weekend of deer season so my husband won’t change them until he gets home and clothes/supplies are washed and put away. We will do it before next weekend, though!
We have fire and smoke detectors on every floor and on most we have 2 or 3. All are hard-wired but we do have battery back-up that my hubby changes regularly. I don’t think you can be too safe. Thank you for sharing.
Yes, thanks for the reminder!!
We just changed the batteries today. So many people forget though!
I actually do have the battery change thing firmly in my head now finally after all these years. I did them yesterday!
No, mine are still lit up and beep when the battery is low, I changed one of them about 2 months ago in fact.
Yes, we always change our batteries when we turn the clocks back!
Changed them earlier this year already so not necessary! 😀
yes we did change them
I changed my batteries! It is so important to do to make sure that I have working smoke detectors in case of a fire!
We did change our batteries when the clocks altered
I haven’t changed them yet but I need to.
We actually did not, but this serves as a great reminder!
Yes, my son actually came home from school and told us to do so since his school had a firefighter and alarm presentation at his school.
Baby and I are still getting used to the time change. Zzzz! 🙂
Yes! We changed all of them.
You betcha I will!!
Thanks!
I did change them in late August.
have not changed them, but this is a good reminder
I did change some of the batteries.
We just changed our batteries last weekend in both!
We’ve recently updated our batteries!