Safety Seymour at your service!

He’s on a mission to recruit C.O. Safety Assistants to help rid homes of a very dangerous threat – that’s C.O. otherwise known as Carbon Monoxide!

Inside appliances like central heating boilers, heat is making the carbon atoms from the fuel combine with oxygen in the air.

This process – called combustion – happens in all sorts of appliances like boilers, cookers and even your barbecue.

Each carbon atom has two oxygen atoms attached to it – C (for carbon), O (for oxygen) – and because there’s two of them, 2! …CO2!

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When there isn’t enough oxygen to go around, each carbon atom from the fuel joins with just one oxygen atom – creating Carbon Monoxide.

Carbon Monoxide is very poisonous to all living things including humans because it steals the oxygen in the bloodstream – which can make you very sick – or even worse!

It’s therefore VERY important that boilers, cookers, heaters – anything with a burning flame – are regularly checked to make sure they’re working correctly.

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What about things that create flames in the garden? Should you be checking the barbecue, fire baskets or bonfires?

These aren’t harmful when they are outside and are open to the sky. But you should never take barbecues into small or confined spaces like tents and you should never have fires inside, unless you have a way for the nasty gas to escape, like up through a swept chimney.