Carbon monoxide warning in basement!?! archived

peteglider

Nov 7, 2006 at 8:06am

My DD calls -- the carbon monoxide detector in the basement (storage area, gas boiler, gas hot water heater) is shouting (yes, it speaks) a warning.

The garage is the front part of the basement - and I'm thinking that the exhaust fumes probably went in the basement from the garage when the door between the garage and basement was opened. (BUT this could be a blocked chimney or something, too, right?!)

None of the other detectors on the 1st or 2nd floor are going off.... (just in a mild panic, since this has never happened, and I'm not at home).

If this persists - who to call? PSEG?? PLumber??

Pete

kibbegirl

Nov 7, 2006 at 8:32am

peteglider, please call PSEG. In the old house, ours went off too and I shrugged it for a while because like you, the first and second floor alarms weren't going off. I called PSEG, read what the read was to them and they told me to get out of the house immediately. Open as many windows and doors that you can inorder to produce fresh air. When PSEG arrived minutes later, it was indeed a boiler carbon monoxide problem. They "fixed" it temporarily, tagged it and we were not to take the tag off until our boiler guys fixed the problem and reported back to PSEG. Please call them...NOW.

MichaelKMcKell

Nov 7, 2006 at 8:38am

I would think it was the car. My house is the same with the garage being under the bed rooms and detector near by.
When you get home try an experiment: Open the garage and back in while running and see if it goes off.
As to who to call? Plumber.

bajou

Nov 7, 2006 at 9:08am

Get out of the house! Carbon monoxide has to be fairly high to trigger the alarm. You have gas boiler, gas hot water heater in that area then that could be it. Get out and call PSE&G. They have a carbon monoxide hot line.

peteglider

Nov 7, 2006 at 12:48pm

BIG BIG THANKS to Gateway --

I was very concerned, not being at home, and my daughter at home.

David from Gateway was at the house within 20 minutes, was very reassuring to my daughter, thoroughly checked the boiler, water heater, flue. He called me while I was on my way home and told me what he found and what to watch for. Made a great recommendation for a "low level" carbon monoxide detector.

I also want to thank Anna at his office, who handled the call and got someone so quickly to my home.

David is a classy act, didn't charge for this, either.

THANKS --

Pete