Christmas Tree Fire Safety 101

12/7/2022 (Permalink)

Having proper fire safety knowledge can put your mind at ease and let you enjoy the holidays with a wonderfully decorated tree!

It's December, and around this time of year, many families will be getting a tree to decorate for the holiday season. While artificial trees are very popular to use for ease of setup and cleanup, many families opt to use real evergreen trees for decorating. There's certainly a special feeling about going out with the family to get the right tree!

Living trees inside a home can raise risks of a fire hazard, so we at SERVPRO® are Here to Help™ with some handy tips for how you can keep your home and office safe for the holidays.

• Make sure the lights you purchase for your tree are safe for use in it. Some lights have a higher wattage and produce more heat than others. Making sure you choose the right kind of lights can make all the difference in preventing a fire.
• Make sure your live tree gets plenty of fresh water. When purchasing a tree, also look out for ones that are incredibly dry or are shedding needles. These are more susceptible to fire damage.
• Always unplug your lights when you go to sleep or leave the home/office. Accidents can happen when you least expect them to, so make sure the lights are off and unplugged whenever you're not home to keep a close eye on your tree.
• Make sure your tree is at least 3 feet away from any source of heat. The hotter and dryer the tree gets, the more likely that it could catch fire in the event of faulty wiring in the lights or if there is a live flame near it. Keeping it away from heat sources serves to mitigate this issue.

With these handy fire safety tips in mind, you'll be able to go all out in decorating your tree for the holidays. In the event of fire and smoke damage, you can also call us here at SERVPRO of Kaufman County, Mesquite to assist and make the damage "Like it never even happened™".