Photoelectric Smoke Detectors vs Ionized Smoke Detectors: THE FACTS

Before I go any further, I will say that I prefer Photoelectric 100% of the time over Ionized, and I hope that after you read/watch this, you will too; for your own home safety. Wether its monitored (by companies such as ADT) or not, having one makes all of the difference in the world!

Here's a scary statistic: Every year, fire damage accumulates to 8 billion dollars in America. In fact, fires cause more deaths and damages to property than all natural disasters... COMBINED. Think for a second: Every hurricane, tornado, earthquake, tsunami, what ever it may be. Fire kills more people and does more damage every year.

Another fact, is 1 in 5 homes will have a burglary or a house fire in the next 3 years. 1 in 5! Look down your street, the chances are in the next 3 years one of the houses will have a break in or a fire; and I know we all say "it will never happen to me", but so did the people that had 8 billion dollars in fire damage last year.

First of all, here is a video that I have found, and use frequently when discussing fire safety, to show the differences in ionized (typical cheap fire alarms) and photoelectric (more expensive, less frequent in homes)

This video was done by a news station, just for pure information purposes, and it is very eye opening!

The issue with slow responses of Ionized smoke alarms is actually well known and you can find that information to be true with a simple Google search. In US and Canada, 95% of homes have an Ionized smoke alarm installed. Ready for the scary part? In a Residential house fire, with Ionized smoke detectors, the survival rate is only 40%! That means over half of them are not survived. That is truly scary. Ready for something else? The survival rate of residential house fires with Photoelectric alarms is 96%. That is an astronomical difference! About 20% of the time, Ionization alarms will NEVER go off! They are more likely to go off when you are cooking, and be a nuisance. They are also 8 times more likely to be INTENTIONALLY disabled. Now that I think about it, mine is unhooked and hanging, because it goes off anytime I cook.

The problem is Ionized are meant to pick up the small particles from fast, high heat fires. They can't detect the larger particles in smoke.

So why does this matter to you? People don't die from their house being set on fire. It's not the FIRE that kills them. They are dead long before that from the smoke. Besides the fact that the smoke is generally very dark, and rises, making it difficult to see your way out of a house, as well as difficult to breath.

I have some more fire videos I will post later. My eyes were opened to the real dangers of house fires; I hope yours are too.

Until next time
Chris