Jangan bermain api!

I should write this while it’s still fresh in my head..

We just had Fire Prevention Talk kat ofis ni. Very informative even though the speaker tu cakap broken English and menjerit.Err relevant ke komplen pasal English dia ni?? Ekekeke.. He literally menjerit while talking and I don’t know how he could actually last for an hour talk. Gamaknya dah biasa benar menjerit kot..

In summary (because I don’t intend to repeat the whole presentation here)...Fire kills. And so does smoke. Smoke kills faster than fire due to its toxicity. So all in all, prevention is the best. Things that you must have in a house are a smoke detector and fire extinguisher. Of course the quantity of those depends on the size of your house ye hadek-hadek. And another thing to have, that I have never heard off before is a smoke pocket mask. It’s actually a mask that helps to prevent the inhalation of toxic gas.

Smoke detector is best to be placed in a dining hall. Errr tapi kalau dining hall dekat beno dengan kitchen, sendiri mau ingatlah ye. Jangan sampai asal masak je smoke detector berbunyik ye. It helps a lot especially when fire happened at night and when everyone is asleep. Or even during the day, when everyone tengah kusyuk layan cite Korea ke, cite Hindustan ke hatta cite Melayu sekalipun. Cite Omputih kurang kushyuk dia.. ekekeke.. So, invest in a smoke alarm. Pastu make sure ganti bateri. A good smoke detector will give an indication bila bateri dah weak. No point of having fire alarm tapi bateri dah mampos and not functioning when you needed it most.

Fire extinguisher is best to be placed in a dining hall as well. Best to have two of it. Satu kat dining hall satu kat dalam bilik. Don’t put it in the kitchen sebab kalau api mula kat kitchen and your fire extinguisher is on the other side of the kitchen, harus kena harap yang fire extinguisher tu memadamkan api secara otomatik kan. Kalau Harry Potter lainlah.. exculus menicussssss... *sambil menggoyangkan magic wand dia* zaaaassss api padam.. kekekekeke... Errr.. itu jampi hanyalah rekaan semata. Lagi satu letak dalam bilik so that in case of fire tengah malam, senang je nak grab dalam masa pisat-pisat tu.

Fire extinguisher has its expiry date ye hadek-hadek! Sila cek expiry date extinguisher anda, kalau ada. Once expired, you have to get it replaced. I don’t know what happened kalau expired. Aku tanya presenter tu pun jawapan macam hampeh. So aku assume, pressure dalam extinguisher tu dah kuar abih lah kot kalau dah expired tu. Fire extinguisher ni is a pressurised container. Kalau pressure dah takde dalam tu, tekan macam nak mampos pun takkan kuar apa-apa from it. Kekdahnya, campak dalam api jelah kalau kebakaran ek? Get the type A,B,C and E. Aku tak ingatlah alphabet tu suma untuk apa, buat A untuk physical fire (fire on kerusi, meja, kayu etc) and E for electrical fire. Jangan sesekali simbah air pada electrical fire ye hadek-hadek! Electrocuted lak nanti!

Fire extinguisher can also be used to extinguish fire on human. I just learned that the methods that I thought can be used to extinguish fire on human actually caused harm.. don’t know if it’s “more” than just letting the fire to continue burning the person lah kan. Water, blanket, tanah are not supposed to used untuk memadamkan api kat orang. Kulit boleh lebih melecur, in a different way depending on the method used. Kalau guna blanket, blanket leh lekat kat kulit and bila nak buang blanket tu, kulit tersiat sama. Adoi! Not an option. Kalau guna air, boleh jadik blister besar dan leh affect internal organ. Not an option. Kalau guna tanah (provided leh carik tanah le kan.. takat tanah tayammum tak cukup!), leh kena infection due to bacteria and affect internal organ. Not an option. An option is to guling-guling to the left and right. Tapi kalau orang pregnant yang tak leh nak guling, berdoa je le ye.. So, the best way is to use fire extinguisher. So hadek-hadek, laburkanlah duit anda ke fire extinguisher!

Ok, next is on something that I have never heard off before but apparently is something common in Taiwan, Jepun, Australia and wherever lah. I used to think that kalau ada smoke, you wet a towel and you can breathe using the towel dalam asap. Ni suma pengaruh cite Omputih le ni. Apparently, not. And you can get burnt from smoke because smoke can be at high temperature as well. Kalau guna towel basah, you just cover your hidung and mulut. Tapi mata, rambut, muka segala still exposed. So this mask is to protect your head. You can breathe using this mask and it protects your face, hair and whatever from being burnt by smoke. I don’t know where to get it in Malaysia though.

Some tips that I learned today...
1 – If you are in a high rise building and fire is on below floors that all escape routes caught on fire, stay in the shower room. Dok dalam bathtub better kalau ada. Macam bermandi-manda time ruma terbakar gitu. And aku dok wonder bukan ke air tu boleh boil?? Kekeke.. entah.. but that was what I was told. Block all possible route for smoke, stay in shower, turn on the shower. Call 999 or 112 kalau takde credit or kalau tempat takde line. Then pray. Pray like you’ve never prayed before that someone come to rescue you on time.
2 – If you are in low rise building macam rumah dua tingkat, you can crawl out in case of fire. Asap naik ke atas. So to reduce smoke inhalation, crawl. But crawling is not advisable for high rise building where ramai orang akan bertempiaran lari. You can die due to stampede. So in high rise building, refer number 1.
3 – Before opening “Pintu Rintangan Api” to escape, touch the knob first to know whether it’s hot or not. If it’s hot, it means that fire and smoke are behind the door. So it’s not an exit option. Get the hell out of there.
4 – Electrical fire spread very quickly. Rather than run, extinguish it using fire extinguisher.
5 – Know where you put the keys to your grills.
6 – Kalau ada nak padamkan api dalam periuk or kuali or while cooking, don’t use water. Check dalam youtube kalau nak tengok apa leh jadik. Instead, wet towel and cover the top of the periuk. Or guna fire extinguisher.

Tu je kot tips that I can remember. Whatever it is, invest in good preventive measures. The talk was done by an NGO tapi diorang ni tolong jualkan barang yang pengeluar jual. Harga memamg mahal compare to other products in the market. But they are of better quality lah kononnya. Fire extinguisher tahan 15 tahun katanya. Pastu kalau dah guna, leh get them to refill for free. Oklah tu.. I bought a fire extinguisher, a smoke detector and two masks. Satu untuk aku, satu untuk lakiku. Idak boleh sharing-sharing ye mask ni walaupun sharing is caring katanya.. kekekeke.. Kalau boleh spend duit beli handbag mahal-mahal, takkan tak leh nak beli benda alah ni untuk keselamatan, kan? You can get other cheaper options out there. Whatever it is, just make sure korang get one for yourselves. Home pun kena ada, car pun kena ada sekarang ni. Belilah kat mana-mana. This is really like buying an insurance. Kalau tak terkena takpe. Kalau terkena, udah terlambat.

They showed the pictures of those who survived from fire. Sian sangat tengok. Yang tengok ni terasa sakit, apatah lagi orang yang rasa. Ada tu budak umur 2 tahun. Apalah sangat yang budak tu tau kan.

So again, I strongly urge korang belilah benda-benda ni. Put in your shopping list. If you love your family so much, this is one of the gifts that you can give them. It’s a damn bloody important investment.

Akhir kata, jangan bermain api.. kekekeke.. as if kalau tak main tak leh kena, kan? Ahak. Ilmiah? :P

Angah