Bellwood Principal
by Tom Jahde
May 02, 2008
Summer Tips to Keep You and Your Family
Safe
According to the Consumer Products Safety Commission, while summer can mean more fun, it also means more trips to the emergency room for many Americans. Here are some of the Commission's summer safety tips:
- Always wear a helmet and other safety gear when biking, skating, and skateboarding, and also when riding scooters, all-terrain vehicles, and horses. Studies have shown that bicycle helmets reduce the risk of injury by 85 percent.
- Prevent swimming pool tragedies by placing barriers completely around your pool to prevent access. Use door and pool alarms. Closely supervise your child when he or she is around or in your pool.
- Never bring a charcoal grill indoors. Burning charcoal produces carbon monoxide, which can be deadly.
- When cooking out on a gas grill, check the air tubes to ensure there are no blockages from insects, spiders, or food grease. Check hoses to make sure they are in good shape. Check for cracking, brittleness, holes, and leaks. Make sure there are no sharp bends in the tubes. If you detect a leak, immediately turn off the gas and do not attempt to light the grill until it has been fixed.
- Make sure your playground area is safe. Most playground accidents are from falls, so make sure the surface is soft; use at least nine inches of wood chips or mulch. Concrete, asphalt, or packed dirt surfaces are too hard and can cause injury.
- Allow only one person at a time on a trampoline. Do not allow somersaults. Use a shock-absorbing pad to cover the springs, and place the trampoline away from structures and other play areas. Children under 6 years old should not be allowed to use a full-size trampoline.
- Warn children not to allow a game of hide-n-seek to become deadly. Make sure they cannot get into any old cedar chests, latch-type freezers or refrigerators, iceboxes in campers, clothes dyers, or picnic coolers. Childproof all old appliances and warn children not to play inside them.
- Install window guards to prevent children from falling out of open windows, or install window stops that permit windows to open no more than four inches. Keep furniture away from windows to discourage children from climbing near them.
- If you're mowing your lawn and children enter the area, turn the mower off. If your lawn slopes and you're mowing with a push mower, mow across the slope, never up and down. With a riding mower, drive up and down the slope, not across. Never carry children on a riding mower.
