Fire Prevention Week 2009 Theme!

The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) announced this last week its theme for the 2009 Fire Prevention Week (FPW) campaign “Stay Fire Smart! Don't Get Burned.” The 2009 Fire Prevention Week (FPW) campaign will be held October 4-10. During this 2009 Fire Prevention Week attention will be focused on burn awareness and prevention, as well as keeping homes safe from the leading causes of home fires. We should all practice fire safety all year long. Many potential fire hazards go undetected because people simply do not take steps to fireproof their home.

Eighty-four percent of all fire deaths were attributed to a home fire. By providing valuable information on fire and burn prevention and safety tips, the campaign aims to help the public keep their homes and its occupants safe from fire and burns. Testing the water before putting a child in the bath may sound like common sense. Wearing short or close-fitting sleeves when cooking on the stovetop may show foresight. This and other simple actions may be all it takes to prevent devastating burns.

Fire Prevention Week commemorates the Great Chicago Fire of Oct. 9, 1871. This tragic fire killed some 300 people, left 100,000 homeless and destroyed more than 17,000 structures. One popular legend claims that Mrs. Catherine O'Leary was milking her cow when the animal kicked over a lamp, set the O'Leary's barn on fire and started the fiery conflagration. The city of Chicago was fast to rebuild and soon began to remember the event with festivities.

The Fire Marshals Association of North America believed the 40th anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire should be observed in a way that would keep the public aware of the importance of fire prevention. On Oct. 9, 1911, FMANA sponsored the first National Prevention Day.

In 1920, President Woodrow Wilson issued the first national Fire Prevention Day proclamation. By 1925, President Calvin Coolidge proclaimed the first National Fire Prevention Week, which was Oct. 4-10, 1925. He noted that in the previous year approximately 15,000 lives had been lost to fire in the United States. President Coolidge's proclamation stated, "This waste results from conditions that justify a sense of shame and horror; for the greater part of it could and ought to be prevented.... It is highly desirable that every effort be made to reform the conditions that have made possible so vast a destruction of the national wealth."

National Fire Prevention Week is always the week in which Oct. 9 falls. Each year, a specific theme is chosen and is commemorated throughout the United States.

NFPA has been a worldwide leader in providing fire, electrical, building, and life safety to the public since 1896. The mission of the international nonprofit organization is to reduce the worldwide burden of fire and other hazards on the quality of life by providing and advocating consensus codes and standards, research, training, and education. Visit NFPA's Web site at http://www.nfpa.org.