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Show ~ JANUARY 3, 2001 ~ WASATCH COUNTY B77 COURIER LEreyesy CALLS The Importance of a Fire Escape Plan > JAMES & MORRIS CAREY e Direct property loss due sure to fires was estimated at $10 FOR AP NEWSFEATURES to exterior iiiibedé significant landmarks such as _ billion. | 7 _trees, shrubs, paths, patios ‘Fire has been ‘ai No. {As effective as statistics are and driveway. These will be _ household danger ever. since in helping drive home a point, extremely useful when prede- our prehistoric ancestors got the idea of bringing they can also tend to be calfire. lous. Society tends to regard indoors for cave heating and --woolly mammoth cooking. _ Since then, accidents resulting in the destruction of house-’ holds have occurred: because ° of misunderstandings, miscal- ~ statistics happens as to something someone that else. Rollout or fold-up fire escape ladders consisting of chain or other approved material should be kept at bed- ing place where everyone should gather once safely outside. And once everyone a out, stay out until help arrives termining a central meeting rooms above ground level. _. and never re-enter the house Make certain that windows for any reason. place outside. The plan should easily opened, and window screens can be clearly especially by - Children are particularly peck: vulnerable to home fires. — outline at least two ways out of . the young and old. Small or. Many children believe that. each room, a door and a win- — arthritic hands can make a they can hide from fire. Teach . every one of the 3,570 _ dow, for example. This is espe- - seemingly simple task i ini o them that they can't hide and _ Americans who lost-their lives’ sible. that smoke is equally danger- _ to fire were anything but'astaCA sell dduahbout escape ; .ous.. Many children are familtistic. They were people just — hints is a good start. Practice jar with the “stop, drop and like us, part of someone's fammakes the plan a real lifesaver. - roll" technique used to extinily. ~ Hold organized family fire - guish burning clothing. Not so While the $10 billion figure » drills at least twice annually, well known is the technique Make no mistake about it, cilations and misuse of this powerful force of nature. Today, fire is, without doubt, the single most imme- _ diate threat to people and-resi- | is staggering, buildings and _ dential property. If there is any personal’ property can be doubt that this is the case, replaced; people can't. look at the following statistics _ Are you and your family compiled by the National Fire | prepared for a house fire? How Protection Association would you get out of your (NFPA) for 1999. - burning house? To have work3 e 3,570 Americans lost - ing smoke detectors and proptheir lives and another 21,875 erly charged fire extinguishwere injured as the result of ers isn't enough. You and your fire. | | family must have an Ene @ Fire’ killed more plan. Americans than all natural dis- | Start by dtheethiee an emerasters combined. gency escape plan that clearly © Eighty-two percent of all outlines all the rooms in your fire deaths occurred in resihome, including hallways, -dences. . | stairs, windows and doors. Be and more often if there are eld_ erly people or children in your home. When performing prac- used..to avoid smoke inhalation. Instruct children,and all family members, to crawl on . tice drills, vary the location of | their knees (staying low to the the “fire” since an. escape ground) and, if possible,. to ~ | _ ‘route can change according to keep their mouths covered fire location. —° | with a towel or cloth as a Once everyone oon means of avoiding smoke cially important for bedrooms, what to do, perform runinhalation. since most residential fires throughs — with closed — Finally, designate someone occur while the family is eyes,simulating darkness or to call the fire department asleep. The easier of the two . smoke filled passages,countusing a cell phone or a neighshould be the primary route ing and memorizing the num-— bor's telephone. (usually the door). The win-. ber of steps to each and every For more pale enon. on dow should be used if fire pre- turn, and ultimately to safety.. fire safety, contact your local . vents the door from being _ An integral element of an — fire prevention aeeney or the used. escape plan is a preset meet- _ State fire marshal. | _The View From My Room | _ shade fill my little room, on the second floor of our house, overlooking a quiet corner in old Heber City. In the summer I can open my win- MATTHEW HEIMBURGER “i - SPECIAL TO THE COURIER {&_ tthe close of the year 2000, | / lete \ | write to you from an obsoToshiba laptop resting atop 7 turn-of-last-century Salt ae Lake | School District writing desk. It is. cracked and worn—barely stable, and | have to set my computer on top of old postcards just to make it © | level with the world. dows and hear the gurgling of the irri- gation ditch through the screens. In the winter, I am content to be able to Just as I would never put a televi- . to take place that seemed harmless in or power generator in my the past. Now, however, they must re-_ upstairs room because of the drastic examined for. the future. That. sion _ see the stars through frosted glass. If you should upstairs drive light on by and (windows South) that is me, and I am | ne this column. | see the effects they would have on my writing, facing I can’t believe that anyone who cares probably | at all about the uniqueness of this valley would contemplate an asphalt ~ plant, higher-density housing projects, _ Why tell of the physical location — -or strip-malls to obscure a a ee te te. He Take our own Heber City: it is a great little city in a great little valley— one that I choose freely to live in and make their causes technically legal, — but it won’t make them desirable. Like the recreationists that smash their beer bottles around their camp- sites, and then look for other—more In the former is ing you to stay either.) Just as I look around my little upstairs room and see the seeds of inspiration lying all about, ~ Jack Kerouac, Paul Theroux, and a World Atlas—attesting to a basic rest- I look at this city and valley and find similar landmarks. The _ old _Jessness belied by more stable selections such as the Gandhi Reader and the Oxford History of the Roman _ Tabernacle, the too-small but veryambitious library, and the transforma--tion-in-progress of the Old North ‘World. School. Views of Timpanogus (not yet obscured by cabins) that change with each minute; blue skies with no inversion layer to compete with; and a pal- . pable peace that enables me to hear a lawnmower (or snowblower) from a_ | mile away. Even the people that pro-— ~ vide the characters for this setting are — of books—a stack of “read” and a stack of “need to read.” As to future literary aspira- tions, I have Abdelrahman Munif’s Cities of Salt, Steinbeck’s East of Eden, and Hugh Prather’s Notes to Myself _ waiting to enlighten. _ Within a ceramic mug made years ago by my brother sits a bookmark with a full-body shot of Esther . Williams i in ove prime. Also on the k¥** where I write? Because I find that ed community college. | environment is crucial to the act of © That they would fide hetund tert creation. And that is true at all levels. language or sliding zoning laws might — _ bea part of. (i suspect no one is forc- I am surrounded by columns process—though sometimes painful—is normal and even healthy. Clearly we must all realize that ends and means are intimately connected, a and act accordingly. amazing. We do not see many traffic © pristine—campsites the next time out, there are those who truly believe that short-term gain will always outweigh long-term effect. That is just not true. Yes it’s common elsewhere, but we’re not talking about elsewhere, we’re talking about our collective home. Our environment is crucial to our lives. If we despoil it, we threaten our- selves first and foremost—and our progeny forever afterward. That there will always be some willing to sacrifice the well-being of the masses for their own profit is a sad reality of human nature, but the masses are not powerless. We can. work to defeat I It is late. Soft jazz at 91.1 and warm light from a modern lamp with a red that do not hon- Tren _ for laser eye surgery.| oe our the integrity of their surround- a startling revelation of catastrophe. . ings; if such developments “get off on Yes, this is still a valley to wrap — technicalities” we can boycott their yourself up with, to settle down and — services until they shrivel up and fail. create within: whether that means a Yes, there are many bc dah to say “No— work of art, a sustainable business, or not here!” — _ an exemplary family, is up to you. _ Oh, there’s more to my own immeHowever, at the close of this year, diate environment than just what I there are threats to that reality. They have told you. For example, there’s come with attractive names like “conmy dirty laundry lying in a wicker basvenience”,”efficiency”, and - ‘ket... (i never said that I didn’t have “Progress’—but a are threats any—I suspect we all do.) Even as a _ nonetheless. — community, we have allowed activities er invitations to Masquerade balls past, and a coupon for a free consultation : weenie Telling you “where” not seem as important “why,” but it is. Our plays a prominent role in - icike may as “what” or environment all that we do ‘as human beings—whether we notice or not. Therefore, thank heavens there are still a few places like the _ Heber Valley, for who knows when the unique perspectives and views that can germinate here will move forward to aid the larger plight of humanity. — ~The fight to preserve its heritage and conserve its beauty is really the fight. | to save our own souls and to determine the course of the future. Wake up, then, my friends—get your bearings by Timpanogos, take a deep breath of clean mountain air, and fight on. Matthew Heimburger ts a professor of American civilization at Young University. He lives‘here in the Heber Valley with his wife and son. rrr label, tape recordings of my father’s love letters home from Vietnam, fancy jams, irate commuters, or bank robberies here. A siren is still, thankfully, ws _ desk: an old fashioned desk clock with Utah’s time sitting above New York’s |