By Alicia Dorr, Regional Communications Manager
Carena Levelson was asleep on the living room couch when she was awakened by the high-pitched sound of smoke alarms going off in her Muskegon rental home. It was just past midnight as the smoke and acrid smell quickly filled the home. Christmas was three days away.
She crawled to the door and into the December cold. Then it hit her. Three family members – ages 16, 14 and 13 – were all still in the home.
“The minute I got out of the house, I started screaming that they were still inside,” Levelston said. “The fire started small, but it got big and moved so fast.”
Luckily, the family members got out unharmed, having jumped from a second-floor window into the waiting arms of neighbors who came to help. Looking back, she credited the smoke alarms installed by the American Red Cross for saving her family from a tragic situation in 2019.
“If it hadn’t been for those alarms going off, we would not have made it out,” Levelston said.
Home fires are the nation’s most frequent disaster, claiming, on average, seven lives a day. To reduce home fire-related injuries and fatalities the American Red Cross provides free smoke alarms and teaches home fire safety as a part of the Home Fire Campaign since 2014.
In Michigan, the Red Cross will install its 80,000th smoke alarm in the next few weeks. The noteworthy install will take place during Sound the Alarm beginning April 13 through May 11. It’s an annual event to raise awareness about the importance of having working smoke alarms in your home and how to keep you and your family safe in the event of a home fire. Through these efforts, the Red Cross will surpass 31,000 Michigan households made safer.
Levelston said the fire destroyed the home but the response that night and days later from Red Cross volunteers and others overwhelmed her.
“The Red Cross volunteers were welcoming, passionate about our safety and how we were going to receive help,” she said. “It’s amazing that a tragic event can happen and someone can get a call at midnight and they jump in to help.”
Levelston said that the experience has made her a vocal advocate for home fire safety.
“I make it known this is nothing to play with. Make sure you have working smoke alarms in your home. You can lose everything so quickly,” she said.
To request a smoke alarm installation visit RedCross.org/SoundtheAlarmMichigan for more information.
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