One of the most overused clichés is that smoke alarms have cut fire deaths in half.

This claim is still promoted, and it has led to blind acceptance of the ionization detectors poor performance.

Let’s look at past NIST claims and then examine the facts.

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1. 1. SMOKE DETECTORS
      
      “The Greatest Success Story in Fire Safety
      

   2.   in the Last Part of the 20th Century”
      
      according to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

(c) Copyright July 09

1. 1. •“. . .US home usage of smoke alarms rose from less than 10% in 1975 to at
      least 95% in 2000, while the number of home fire deaths was cut nearly in half.”
      
      

   2. •“Thus the home smoke alarm is credited as the greatest success story in fire
        safety in the last part of the 20th century, because it alone represented a highly
        effective fire safety technology with leverage on most of the fire death problem
        that went from only token usage to nearly universal usage in a remarkably short
        time.”

NIST - Performance on Home
Smoke Alarms - July 2004

Note:
14.7M

396 pages