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Summary: A house fire alarm should be tested at least once a month, and all of the batteries should be changed twice a year to assure they are operational. Find out how to maintain smoke detectors with helpful tips from a fire and life safety educator in this free video on fire safety.
Meg Langston is the full-time community fire and life safety educator for the Wilmington Fire Department. She is responsible for coordinating educational efforts throughout the city.read more
"Smoke alarms should be tested once a month and your battery should be changed twice a year. There are easy compartments on the back of your smoke alarm that you can open up very easily where your batteries are, you can take the batteries out and replace them but we do recommend that you do that twice a year. The best time to change your batteries is going to be when the time changes so we just had a time change about three weeks ago so change your batteries when you change your time. That's a good time to remember twice a year and you should test them once a month and by testing all you have to do is push the little button that's on your smoke alarm and make sure that it beeps. There are buttons on each one of them and they sometimes look a little different but if you push that button and you hold it down for about five to ten seconds you should hear it start beeping. If you have smoke alarms in your home that are interconnected which means all the smoke alarms are connected to each other are hardwiring to your home then you do want to make sure that you hear them beeping in every room because that is a reminder that they are working in every room. Now something to remember with hardwired smoke alarms or smoke alarms that are wired throughout your house is that they usually have a battery back up in them as well and the reason for that is when you lose power or electricity in your house you want to make sure that you have a smoke alarm that is working there as well so even though you have a hardwired smoke alarm we do recommend that you change the batteries in them twice a year."
eHow Article: How Often to Test a House Fire Alarm
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