Wake Up Call

A few nights ago I had gone to sleep late only to be awoken about an hour after I had gone to bed. I stirred for a moment when I heard a “chirping” noise, I laid in bed and heard it again…I realized it was the Combination Carbon Monoxide and Smoke Alarm, courtesy of Peace Corps. I’ll confess, I hadn’t even opened it until my Regional Manager visited and I had to test it in front of her…oops. I opened it then and it seemed to work fine, but on this night it seemed to be malfunctioning! I got all the way up, clicked the light on, removed the batteries and began to read the User’s Manual, yea the paper that came with it that few people read J I opened a window while I was doing this, just in case. After reading it I realized how confusing this device this really is:
Carbon Monoxide: Flashes red, 4 beeps, pause, 4 beeps, pause, etc
Smoke: Flashes red, 3 beeps, pause, 3 beeps, pause, etc.
Chirping once per minute = low battery warning
Chirping 3 times every minute while flashing red = device is not working properly and needs to be replaced
Now it’s 1:30 in the morning and I have silenced the stupid thing and find myself wondering how many times it chirped – I knew that it wasn’t smoke and then began to get paranoid that it was Carbon Monoxide – thankfully, the manual has a lot about this poison and I learned a few things –
If the alarm is exposed to 400 ppm of CO it must alarm between 4 and 15 mins
If the alarm is exposed to 100 ppm of CO is must alarm between 10 and 50 mins
If the alarm is exposed to 70 ppm of CO it must alarm between 60 and 240 mins
It also gives the length of time one can be exposed before ever experiencing a life threat.
**WARNING: Actuation of your CO Alarm indicates the presences of Carbon Monoxide, which can kill you. In other words, when your CO Alarm sounds, you must not ignore it!** Great! I took the batteries out!
An exposure to 100 ppm of CO for 20 mins may not affect average healthy adults, but after 4 hours the same level may cause headaches
An exposure to 400 ppm of CO may cause headaches in average, healthy adults after 35 mins, but can cause death after 2 hours
I couldn’t remember if I had a headache, but reading all this material was certainly giving me one!
Mild exposure: Slight headache, nausea, vomiting, fatigue, “flu-like” symptoms
Medium exposure: Throbbing headache, drowsiness, confusion, fast heart rate
Extreme exposure: Convulsions, unconsciousness, heart and lung failure, brain damage, death
Now here was my dilemma – it’s now 2 in the morning and I know should go to bed, I have to wake up in five hours – but being the cautious paranoid woman that I can sometimes be, I thought, ‘if there is CO in here and I go to bed, I could not wake up, never experiencing any symptoms.’ I know it’s crazy and ridiculous and call me selfish, but there are some things that I haven’t done yet, that I would like to before death comes. I decide the fastest I could possibly die is 2 hours (if there are 400 ppm of CO in the air – this is morbid…I know), but I would probably feel symptoms before this. I’m no longer tired and decide to read a book for a while. At 3:30, I decide it would be a good idea to get some sleep and I haven’t experienced any symptoms of CO poisoning – and my apartment doesn’t really even have a BIG threat of it anyway– it’s way too drafty in here – I go to bed, but not before setting an alarm to wake me at 4:30, 5:30, 6:30 and 7:30 – I know this sounds ridiculous – but that’s what I did…I thought if there was CO in the air, I would certainly have symptoms first and get out of my apartment! Well, 7:30 came and I got up and went to work, to my surprise, not all that tired! I work all day and when I arrive home from work I re-install the batteries and begin to watch a movie – then I hear it – 3 chirps, then nothing – I wait – I hear it again 3 chirps and then nothing – it was then that I realize that, of course, the device is not working properly and my work during overnight the night before was in vain. But I think I knew this – I mean, I didn’t have any problems when it was still in the package…