Posted April 16, 2019

Six years ago today, Daryl and Shirley Jenkins lost their lives to CO poisoning in a hotel room while on vacation in Boone, NC. In memory of them and the thousands of other victims who have been injured and/or died in U.S. hotels of this very preventable cause, we shared a series of four posts on The Jenkins Foundation Facebook page…https://www.facebook.com/thejenkinsfoundation/

Here are the posts:

Post #1 of 4 – These are the smiling faces of Daryl and Shirley Jenkins. Six years ago today, what had started as a fun-filled vacation, ended in tragedy. After failing to meet their traveling companions (Shirley’s brother and his wife) for breakfast in the hotel lobby, they were discovered dead in their hotel room. It would take six weeks and the death of an 11-year-old boy, Jeffrey Williams, in the same room before authorities would figure out the cause was carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning. Incredibly, the hotel had no CO detection installed despite having gas fireplaces in its guest rooms and multiple natural gas fired appliances. CO detection would not only have alerted Daryl and Shirley to the fact they were in life threatening danger, it also would have provided an alert to the hotel staff that their pool heater was discharging lethal levels of CO.
No one should be suffering injury, much less dying, in a hotel due to CO poisoning – detection systems and alarms have been readily available for three decades. That’s right, three decades.
This week, in memory of Daryl and Shirley, we will be posting information about CO poisoning in hotels and the reasons why it continues to happen. It’s not rare, it is a very real danger that continues to exist and poses life threatening risk to travelers in this country every day. We hope this information will not only encourage you to carry a CO alarm when you travel, but also prompt you to ask questions when staying at hotels about whether they have CO detection onsite and if it covers every guest room. Check out the safety devices in your hotel room – including that nondescript blinking one on the ceiling…is it a CO alarm, a combination fire/CO alarm, or a fire alarm only…ask the hotel staff, do they know? Contact us to share your experiences – we can all be a collective voice for change in this industry.🐤

Post #2 of 4 – How often does it happen?

After Daryl and Shirley Jenkins were killed by carbon monoxide in their hotel room, and 11-year-old Jeffrey Williams died a few weeks later in the very same room, we began to wonder. We found a published medical study from 2007 (“Carbon Monoxide Poisoning at Motels, Hotels and Resorts” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17572307) and learned that no one knows for sure how often this is happening because no federal agency tracks hotel CO incidents, nor do they track the resulting deaths and injuries.

So we started doing media searches ourselves to try and find the answer. We found an incredible number of cases. So many, in fact, we started a list…which eventually turned into a spreadsheet covering a 50+ year timespan. We’ve documented 335 incidents that have resulted in 157 deaths and over 2,200 injuries. Since Daryl and Shirley died, there have been 92 more cases of CO exposures in U.S. hotels and at least 6 more deaths – including that of a 13-year-old boy who died on the deck of an indoor pool while attending a spring break pool party (https://www.wyff4.com/…/hotel-incident-puts-focus-o…/9228016).

These are minimum numbers – not all cases receive media attention and not all incidents are correctly identified as carbon monoxide related.

You can check out our spreadsheet of hotel incidents on the Jenkins Foundation website https://thejenkinsfoundation.com/hotel-co-incidents/ 🐤

Post #3 of 4 – Aren’t there laws in the U.S. requiring hotels to protect their guests from carbon monoxide poisoning?

In most states in the U.S., the answer is no. Currently, only 14 states have laws requiring CO detection in hotels (http://www.ncsl.org/…/carbon-monoxide-detectors-state-statu…). And, of those states, many only require detection in newly constructed hotels and only in certain rooms. There are no federal requirements.

Carbon monoxide is a toxic, invisible gas that has no odor – it is undetectable without the aid of an alarm. In high concentrations, it can incapacitate and kill a person within minutes. Federal safety agencies urge people to install CO alarms in their homes, on every level and near all sleeping areas. Carbon monoxide is especially dangerous when you are asleep – if there’s no alarm to alert you to its presence, you might not wake up in time to escape. People most at risk from the effects of CO: children, infants, pregnant women and their unborn babies, older people.

In 36 states (and in random hotels in the other 14) you and your family could be locked in for the night in your hotel room…all tucked in…without a single CO alarm to safeguard you while you sleep…even if you’re sleeping in a room with a gas fireplace, right next to a room containing a commercial-size gas appliance, like Daryl and Shirley Jenkins were. If CO is leaking into your room, there will be no way for you to know. If you and your family become unconscious from the CO, no one will know you are in need of rescue. If you are like many of the people this has happened to, the hotel staff will not find you until you’ve missed checkout, hours or perhaps days later.

Hotels are not required to disclose whether they have CO detection installed. They are not required to educate their staff about the dangers of CO. And they are not required to have emergency evacuation protocols specific to a CO incident.

Don’t let your family be the next tragedy. Pack a CO alarm and stay safe🐤

Post #4 of 4 – What is the hotel industry doing to address this danger?

Ask them. The hotel industry has not publicly stated that they have adopted any kind of industry standard with regard to CO detection. Some of the hotel chains simply state that they expect their franchises to follow all state and local regulations (even though there are only 14 states that have any such laws requiring CO detection in hotels).

In USA Today articles from a few years ago, a representative of the American Hotel and Lodging Association stated, “CO incidents are rare, there’s no need for laws requiring hotels to have alarms.” https://www.usatoday.com/…/hotels-carbon-monoxide-…/1707863/
And, “Equipping each room with an alarm — which cost about $100 apiece and must be replaced about every five years — is too expensive compared with the risk.”
https://www.usatoday.com/…/…/hotels-carbon-monoxide/1707789/

To the additional detriment of guests, the hotel industry has also not publicly disclosed their decision NOT to adopt an industry standard requiring CO detection in every hotel. Nor are they backing any travel awareness campaigns urging people to travel with their own alarms.

Think of how easy it would be to make a hotel selection if there was a simple disclosure on a hotel’s website:
“Dear Guest – Along with fluffy towels and high threadcount bed linens, your room is safeguarded with CO detection”
Or…
“Dear Guest – NO CO DETECTION ONSITE. We Have Deemed the Risk to Your Life Not Worth Spending Our Money On. Bring Your Own CO Alarm and Stay at Your Own Risk.”

A version of this kind of transparency that allows guests to make informed decisions about where to stay already exists in the vacation rental market. Check out Airbnb’s policy for comparison:
https://www.airbnb.com/trust/home-safety

As the traveling public, we deserve better. We all have a choice and a voice and can use both to make a difference. Ask questions before your stay and leave feedback after – tell hotels how important CO detection is to you. Until we have a safety system in this country that affords protection from this very preventable danger, pack your own alarm and stay in places that genuinely value your safety.🐤