Will your smoke and CO alarms still work in a blackout?
We got hit with that big wind storm a couple weeks back. Power and internet were both down for almost three full days. We ran a propane heater to stay warm, and when i was going through our emergency kit afterwards, I realized something I’d never really thought through.
I have no idea if our smoke and co alarms actually hold up when the power and internet are both out.
Our setup is kind of a mess right now. Some are old hardwired ones with 9v battery backups, but i don’t trust those to last through a long outage. We also have one wifi smart alarm that’s nice for phone alerts normally, but once the internet drops all the remote features are dead. It just beeps on its own and that’s it. For co we only have one old standalone unit tucked away by the furnace.
What worries me most is co risk during outages. Everyone pulls out generators and propane heaters when the power goes out, and that’s when most of those accidents happen. And of course that’s exactly when your internet is down too.
What do people usually do? Is there a good option that doesn’t need internet or wall power, and still triggers all the alarms through the whole house?