An incident at a school in Oklahoma, has raised the question how safe is the school. A faulty heater in an elementary school in Oklahoma City left 6 people in hospital on Monday. Luckily, no serious injuries have been reprted. This incident has highlighted that it is not law in the state of Oklahoma to have public schools fitted with carbon monoxide alarms.

It has emerged that it was only compulsory to have a carbon monoxide alarm fitted in all new residential construction, however not in public schools or commercial property. Because it is not required by law, does not mean that some public schools and commercial properties haven’t taken extra precautions. Flowermound School Superintendent Diana Jackson stated that, “We are ahead of the situation, after a safety inspector made the recommendation to do so in the summer of 2012, we intergrated a carbon monoxide alarm into our security systems. If it ever does detect the presence of carbon monoxide, it will immediately notify the alarm company.”

The carbon monoxide alarm is located in the kitchen of the cafeteria due to the gas range, oven and water heater. Mark Mitchell, Lawton Fire Marshal mentions that having a carbon monoxide alarm is just as important as having a smoke alarm. He mentions a reason for it not being compulsory in schools, might be due to the fact that no-one sleeps there overnight. When we are sleeping we are vulnerable, as we can not detect any symptoms such as dizziness, headaches, nausea and confusion.

“Anything that we are able to do in order to prevent an incident or accident happening, we are thankful for and always will be, it should be noted that these things help make us aware of such dangers and should be required by law,” said Mitchell.