Warning over ‘silent killer’ carbon monoxide

In 2011 Mr Wessling and his girlfriend Hazel Woodhams went camping in Great Yarmouth, England.

They cooked a meal on a portable barbecue. Hours later, when the appliance had cooled and they were packing up for the evening, they brought it into their tent in case it rained overnight. The following morning Mr Wessling woke up disorientated and with a numb right arm. Ms Woodhams was unresponsive. She had died overnight.

Mr Wessling told the Irish Examiner he was bewildered at what had happened.

“It took a long, long time to formulate thoughts,” he said. “The time from when I woke to when I raised the alarm was probably just minutes but it felt like hours.”

Mr Wessling taught forensic science and Ms Woodhams was a scenes-of-crimes officer for West Yorkshire police. As such he was aware that the scene would be preserved. What did surprise him was his own slurred speech when talking to responders, and his inability to remember anything out of the ordinary happening.

“If you have a man and a woman at the scene, and the woman is dead, the most obvious thought is that the man killed her,” he said.

“They probably thought I was dealing drugs,” he said of his composure at the time.

He was arrested for the murder of his girlfriend, a frightening experience that ended when blood tests revealed dangerously high levels of carbon monoxide in his system. It then became clear that, even after its use, the portable barbecue was emitting carbon monoxide, and that the sealed tent trapped them in with the gas.

Mr Wessling was cleared of any wrongdoing.

He has since campaigned to raise awareness of the silent killer, and said he is not surprised by the findings of a survey that revealed that 1.4m people in Ireland are at risk of carbon monoxide poisoning because they do not have an alarm.

“To most people the threat of fire is very real, it is visible and most people have burned themselves to some degree, even if it’s off a hot oven. Human instinct is to be wary of it. You don’t need to convince people of the dangers of fire, but carbon monoxide is just not there for many, it’s invisible.”

Mr Wessling has said the greatest challenge is changing the behaviour of what he describes as “ostriches” — people who are aware of the dangers of carbon monoxide but do nothing because they believe it is a problem that will never happen to them.

“Get an audible carbon monoxide alarm. They are around €20 in most DIY stores and it will keep you safe for around seven years. That works out at less than one cent a day,” he said.

He also advised people to get their appliances serviced regularly, particularly those with older boilers.

On average six people in Ireland die each year as a result of unintentional CO poisoning. At low levels, it can cause serious illness.

Survey findings

A survey conducted for Carbon Monoxide (CO) Awareness Week questioned 1,000 adults in face-to-face interviews across 63 sampling points around the country. The survey found:

• 1 in 3 people have not had their boiler serviced within the past year — this is highest in Connacht.
• 7% of those with a CO alarm had a scare with the alarm going off at least once in the past year, but of those, a third of people said they pulled out the battery or put the alarm outside rather than taking action.
• One in 6 adults (650,000 people) have blocked a vent to keep heat in and draughts out — rising to 1 in 5 in the under-24 age group and in those aged 50-64.
• 29% (450,000) of those with solid fuel have not had their chimney swept in the past year.
• 44% of adults who don’t have an alarm and are at risk of CO poisoning just haven’t got around to getting one.

Based on the survey, campaigners say 1.4m people are at risk of carbon monoxide poisoning because they don’t have a carbon monoxide alarm