Here is my PSA for the day.
Before it gets too cold outside do not forget to schedule your dryer vent cleaning. I am referring to the vent that runs from your dryer to the vent outside of your house.
This is something I never thought much of until a family friend lost 3 of their children and their new home to a dryer fire. They woke up in the middle of the night to their house in flames. She was not using the dryer but had been earlier in the day, apparently the fire smodered in the vent line before it spread.
I have since learned dry fires are not uncommon. We have our line 'blown out' everyother fall and I am amazed at how much lint is in the line. Esp. since most of our clothes are dry-cleaned and it is just DH and I - so we do not have a ton of landry.
PLEASE be safe and have your vent cleaned.
Re: Prevent dryer fires
Thanks for the PSA. How horribly tragic for your friend. That breaks my heart
I will remind DH to do this. We've been meaning to because I've noticed clothes taking longer to dry.
Any appliance store that installs W/D should be able to do it. The first time I called around I felt like a fool, until I learned that this is a common maintence service call. They put a 'trap' outside of your house on the end of the vent to catch all the lint.
PS -they will also remove the back of the dryer and clean that out.
This concept only works if you have your dryer hooked up to the exterior wall that vents your dryer.
Unfort. many homes, esp new homes the landry rooms are located for convenience and often the vent lines are long.
Even though the vent pipes are now metal , unfort. tragic fires still occur.