An emergency gas engineer pulled two people from separate houses within 48 hours, as deadly carbon monoxide almost killed them.
Dan Howard, 30, had to carry two seriously ill people from their homes in Merseyside just two days apart. The first incident happened at an upstairs flat in Liverpool City Centre.
Dan, who has worked for Cadent for nine years, said he received a call after a man was reading through a leaflet and recognised he had some symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning.
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The Cadent worker said: "When I arrived, I turned the gas off and completed all my checks. The customer was upstairs, in a front room, slurring his words and very lethargic.
"It didn’t look good. He told me there was a boiler in the kitchen, where the door was closed. I used my kit to check the edges of the door and the readings started to rise dramatically.
"I opened all the windows and told the customer we had to get out, by hell or high water we had to get out. He said he couldn’t move – so I put him over my shoulder and got him outside.
"I learned later that he was in intensive care for days and, if he’d stayed in the house for just a few more hours, he would most likely have died. Unfortunately, his home didn’t have any carbon monoxide detectors."
A second incident happened just two days later, on Boxing Day after a family had celebrated Christmas together the day before and one of the women complained of feeling unwell. The family came back to check on her the next day after putting her to bed to "sleep it off" and noticed the carbon monoxide alarm had activated.
Dan said: "When I got there, I isolated the gas and ventilated the property. I could see the customer had lots of tell-tale symptoms – red eyes, red face, things like that. What can catch you out is that the symptoms are a lot like a hangover.
“I immediately rang for an ambulance and informed them of the severity of the situation, due to the CO readings throughout the property. I assisted the customer to a safe place and waited for the paramedics.
"Next thing, three incident support units arrived and she was treated for CO poisoning.”
Cadent have confirmed both incidents were traced to defects with boilers. Dan is sharing the stories in the hope of educating people to the dangers of carbon monoxide.
He said: "I couldn’t believe it – less than 48 hours from carrying a fella over my shoulder, down the stairs, to get him outside, I was at another incident where I had to do almost the same thing.
“It never ceases to amaze me that people don’t get an annual gas service, and don’t always install CO alarms. I know times are hard, but this isn’t something that’s worth taking a risk about.
“Book a Gas Safe registered engineer to carry out your service and pick up a CO alarm – or alarms – for as little as £15 from many retailers. It could save your life, or your family.”
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