Door-to-door Dover fire prevention: Volunteers deploy to install free smoke alarms

William Westhoven, Morristown Daily Record
·4 min read

DOVER − Working their way south along Thompson Avenue on a cold, rainy Saturday morning, a group of volunteers offering to install free smoke alarms in homes walked by a sobering example of what a fire can do.

"It burned down sometime last year," said Mayor Carolyn Blackman, pointing to the charred remains of a small house surrounded by a security fence.

An assembly of about 100 volunteers, firefighters police and New Jersey Red Cross staff gathered at Dover American Legion Post 27 to organize an outreach project to install smoke alarms in as many homes as possible. Members of the nonprofit social support agency MIRA USA added to the manpower.

The project was part of the nationwide Red Cross Home Fire Campaign that has targeted neighborhoods for similar outreach since 2014. New Jersey Red Cross Executive Director Sarah Huisking said the campaign is credited with "saving 1,400 lives, and 20 of those are actually in New Jersey."

Ed Susco, member of the Board of Directors for the Northen NJ Chapter of the Red Cross leads one of several groups to help check and install smoke detectors. The Dover fire department and the New Jersey Red Cross organized volunteers then went door to door in selected Dover neighborhoods to offer free smoke detector inspections and installations on March 25, 2023.

Huisking told the assembly that the campaign has installed more than 48,000 smoke alarms in 23,000 homes "all because of people like you who come out on a Saturday."

Ten teams eventually deployed to targeted neighborhoods in the Ward 2 section of town and began knocking on doors.

Santo Mesa talks and Dave Marcus, Disaster Action Team Supervisor with the Red Cross into his apartment where a smoke detector was checked and changed. The Dover fire department and the New Jersey Red Cross organized volunteers then went door to door in selected Dover neighborhoods to offer free smoke detector inspections and installations on March 25, 2023.

Team 1, accompanied by Blackman and Second Ward Alderwoman Judith Rugg, found a willing subject in Santos Mesa.

Mesa said he was surprised to see such a large group show up on his doorstep on a Saturday morning. When they explained the reason for their visit, he cheerfully invited them inside the three-story, multi-family dwelling.

"Cool," he said. "All you people have smiley faces so I'm glad to have you here."

The group followed Mesa up a flight of stairs to the second-floor apartment he's called home for the past four years. None of the other tenants were home.

A volunteer technician tested an existing hallway smoke alarm and replaced its battery before installing a new alarm in Mesa's apartment.

"I realize if we just double-check, it's really important, so I'm more than happy to have you guys here and make sure everything is OK," Mesa said.

Dover Mayor Carolyn Blackman and Dave Marcus, Disaster Action Team Supervisor with the Red Cross after they knocked on one of many doors to ask residents about their smoke detectors. The Dover fire department and the New Jersey Red Cross organized volunteers then went door to door in selected Dover neighborhoods to offer free smoke detector inspections and installations on March 25, 2023.

Blackman said she was "just stunned by the number of people who are here today to help the town of Dover."

"That's how we make a community, by volunteering," she said.

Rugg said she was glad to see the outreach to her Ward 2 constituency, some of whom "may not have the funds to install a proper fire alarm or the batteries we all take for granted, to make sure they are safe in their own homes, and that there are no casualties."

Coping with temperatures in the 40s and intermittent rain, the volunteer groups continued to knock on doors until 3 p.m. By design, they bypassed apartment complexes that are inspected by the fire department every five years in favor of houses that Dover Fire Capt. Jon Sperry said "We don't get inside very often."

There was no answer to the door at many addresses. In those cases, bags containing literature about smoke detectors and fire prevention were hung on the doorknob.

Other residents reported they had smoke detectors in good working order.

Aftermath of a devastating fire on Thompson avenue in Dover on Monday, Jan. 3, 2022.
Aftermath of a devastating fire on Thompson avenue in Dover on Monday, Jan. 3, 2022.

Volunteer Staci Grant of Livingston spoke to as many of residents as possible, reminding them that "it only takes two minutes" for a fire to become deadly and that residents were 50% more likely to survive a house fire if working smoke alarms are in place.

Grant, who works at Henry O. Baker Insurance, a block away from the Legion Hall, said she was motivated to volunteer because "It could save lives."

"It's all about preventable consequences," she said. "A Lot of people die in fires when it could have been prevented."

She also revealed a more personal reason for her participation.

"Honestly it's one of my fears, because when I was a kid, we had a fire in our basement," Grant said. "I never really recovered from that. I can still smell that smell."

The goal for the day was to knock on 900 doors. By the end of the day, the volunteer teams had knocked on nearly 1,100 doors and installed 148 free alarms, according to New Jersey Red Cross Communications Manager Sheri Ferreira.

Ferreira said the Red Cross conducted a similar Home Fire Campaign outreach event in Paterson in January, in partnership with MIRA USA. The next one will take place in April at the Holiday City 55-and-older community in Toms River.

Ferreira added the Red Cross is planning a return visit to Dover.

"I'd really like to make this an annual thing," Sperry said.

This article originally appeared on Morristown Daily Record: Volunteers install free smoke detectors to help save neighbors