It seems as though Mother Nature checked her calendar, and waited to bring snow to the Lakeshore.
The white stuff is forecast to fall all week long, which is fitting as this week is also Winter Weather Awareness Week in Wisconsin.
The new Manitowoc County Emergency Services Director, Kayla Beckerdite was on the WCUB Breakfast Club recently, where she talked with Craig Dillon about last year, specifically a shocking number of deaths related to cold weather.
She said, “Even with as mild of a winter as we had last year, we still had about 91 deaths, and over 2,000 emergency room visits due to cold weather.”
And those numbers don’t include traffic-related incidents.
Beckerdite revealed that “We had 38 people killed, and 3,100 injured in traffic crashes.”
A big reason for those non-traffic related issues is surprisingly enough, carbon monoxide poisoning.
Beckerdite said that it is incredibly important to make sure you have a carbon monoxide detector in your home and that it is working properly.
“Especially as it snows, those exhaust pipes can get covered and it backs the CO back into your house,” she explained. “It’s odorless, it’s colorless, and you can’t really smell it until it’s too late.”
The Emergency Services Director said that some signs that you may have carbon monoxide in your home are that you begin suffering from headaches or a general sense of fog or tiredness.
If you do begin experiencing any of these symptoms, you should call 911 immediately.
