SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Leak

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20130917-99144-2147451825. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Matched catalog product: Kidde Smoke Alarm model P4010DCS-W and p4010DCSCO-W. Source model text: KN-COEG-3, P/N 900-0113. Incident: I bought a Kidde Gas and Carbon Monoxide Alarm about a year ago, after we had had a natural gas leak. The gas pipe outside broke, and the gas came into the house through the dryer vent. There are not a lot of Natural Gas Alarms out there. Kidde is a good brand, so I bought their alarm. Well, the gas pipe broke again recently, and the house filled with gas. Thankfully, I have a good gas-sniffing nose, because the alarm registered 0 and did not even chirp once the entire time the gas was in the house. I'm glad we were not out of town or sleeping. The alarm was properly installed, plugged in, it had a working backup battery, and the test I performed afterwards was successful (the alarm is actually quite loud when it works). I called Kidde and they sent me 2 more of the Gas and Carbon Monoxide Alarms. I asked how I can be sure that these alarms will work in the event of another gas leak. The answer was, "YOU CAN'T. YOU JUST HAVE TO RELY ON THE MONITOR. THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO WORK." I don't feel any safer with the alarms. I have no confidence that any of the Kidde gas alarms will function as they should in the event of a gas leak. The scary part is that we won't know if the alarm works until we have a gas leak. We could die in our sleep or blow up the house with the flick of a light switch. Kidde is selling a safety product that carries no assurance of working when needed.