Winter is here, which means it’s time for you to turn up your heaters to stay comfortable.
But did you know, regardless of your home’s or heating system’s age, it can be leaking dangerous – and even deadly – carbon monoxide (CO2) into your home’s air, endangering those who mean the most you?
The statistics from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) regarding carbon monoxide (Co2) poisoning are grim. Every year:
- 20,000 Americans visit the emergency room for non-fire related carbon monoxide poisoning
- 4,000 Americans are hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning
- 400 Americans die from carbon monoxide poisoning
How Can My Home’s Heating System Cause Carbon Monoxide Poisoning?
At Benfatti, we’ve been helping Northshore and Metro New Orleans residents like you get comfortable since 1989.
But when it comes to firing up that heater as temperatures drop, our main goal is to make sure your family is safe from dangerous carbon monoxide poisoning.
If your home’s heater is damaged or compromised, it can release potentially deadly carbon monoxide poisoning into the air your family breathes day and night.
Potential dangers include:
- CO2 leaks from cracks
- Seams in your heating system that are leaking
- Cracks in your heating system’s exhaust piping
- An incomplete combustion process
But how are you to know if any of these dangers are taking place? The answer is, unless you’re a trained heating and air specialist, you just can’t instinctively know on your own, because CO2 is odorless and tasteless.
Symptoms of Carbon Monoxide Poisoning
If you or any members of your family are experiencing the following signs of carbon monoxide poisoning, you should seek immediate medical attention at your nearest Northshore or Metro New Orleans emergency room:
- A very dull headache
- Overall body weakness
- Nausea or vomiting
- Sudden shortness of breath
- Confusion
- Blurred vision
- Loss of consciousness
Learn more about carbon monoxide warning signs from the Mayo Clinic.
How We Can Help Keep Your Family Safe From CO2 Poisoning This Winter
You may think that installing a carbon monoxide detector from your local Northshore or Metro New Orleans hardware store is sufficient for detecting carbon monoxide levels in your home.
Think again.
While carbon monoxide detectors are a must in every household, they’re really only designed to detect high levels of CO2. The sad truth is that they don’t always detect slow leaks that build up overtime, leaving you and your loved ones in extreme danger.
At Benfatti, we help Northshore and Metro New Orleans residents just like you ensure their heaters are safe every winter by performing regular inspections of your heating system. This “annual tune up” should ideally be performed before your start running the heater, but if you’ve already turned the temperatures up inside, it’s still not too late to make sure your family is safe.
Annual tune ups are important for everyone, but become even more important for people like you if:
- You have an older home.
- You have an older heating system.
- You’ve had issues with your heater before.
- You or someone in your family is extremely young, elderly, or immunocompromised.
- Your home was purchased as a foreclosure and you have no accurate information as to the age of your home’s heating system.
Your Family’s Safety is Worth the Heater Annual Tune Up Service Call
We know that at this time of year, you might not be thinking about investing in a tune up of your heater. After all, you live in Louisiana of all places! You only use your heater a few months out of the year!
But the truth is, carbon monoxide poisoning is devastating. Your family’s safety is worth the relatively small fee it costs to conduct an annual heater tune up, and squeeze in an appointment with our Northshore and Metro New Orleans heating and air specialists in between meetings, kids’ events, and family activities.
Contact Us Today to Ensure Your Family’s Safety This Winter.
Whether you’ve already fired up your home’s heater, or if you’re thinking the excessive amount of blankets being used in your home to stay warm aren’t going to cut it anymore, it’s not too late for an annual heater tune up. Call us to schedule one today at (985) 646-0540 on the Northshore or (504) 241-3135 in Metro New Orleans to learn more.
