News

Weymouth family lucky to be alive after carbon monoxide scare

WEYMOUTH, Mass. — One Weymouth family is lucky to be alive after carbon monoxide filled their home.

And firefighters are being praised for helping the family -- a total of 10 people -- to escape from their home.

"I believe their actions saved the lives of those 10 people in the home that morning," said South Shore Health System EMS Director Dr. William Tollefsen.

Just days before Thanksgiving, 10 people gathered in a home in Weymouth and planned to leave for a Disney vacation the next day.

But at some point overnight, their home filled with a deadly gas.

Firefighters said a malfunctioning boiler in the basement of the home caused toxic levels of carbon monoxide to appear on every floor.

The odorless, colorless and tasteless gas is known as the "silent killer" because it slowly poisons victims without them ever noticing.

In this case, the family was lucky.

One person woke up in the middle of the night, became dizzy and collapsed. Another family  member called 911. When firefighters arrived, special carbon monoxide alarms on their gear immediately went off.

The firefighters put on masks and went room to room, waking up the other family members and getting them safely out of the house.

"Without that notification, maybe one person would have been transported to the hospital that morning and 9 others would have slept and potentially become more toxic and not made it to Disney," Tollefsen said.

Firefighters said the home was originally outfitted with smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, but for some reason, the CO detector had been taken down and was not working at the time of the emergency call.

Under state law, carbon monoxide and smoke detectors are required on all floors where people live.

Many local communities have programs to provide the devices to families who can't afford them.

The devices should be replaced every 5 to 7 years.