Man's LIfe
A neighbor discovers a Salt Lake man dead in his home. Salt Lake fire officials say a simple device could have saved his life.
December 13th, 2005 @ 9:49pm
Amanda Butterfield Reporting
Scott Freitag, Salt Lake City Fire Dept.: "This time of year when everyone else has a flu, it's easy to think that's what he had."
But it wasn't the flu that killed Bruce Jensen. It was the fatal fumes of carbon monoxide. For days, even weeks, Jensen unknowingly was breathing in deadly air from the basement of his home.
Bruce Jensen's house is empty now. Though he lived alone, he was close to family in the area and worked downtown for almost 30 years. The hardest part for family and friends is this didn't have to happen.
It was a tough day at Williams and Hunt Law Firm, where Bruce Jensen worked.
Dennis Ferguson, Co-worker: "He's an irreplaceable soul."
But this morning he didn't show up at work. It was unlike him, so the secretary called a neighbor.
Bill Dowse, Neighbor: "I'm the one that found him this morning."
He was dead.
Bill Dowse: "I hollered at him and everything, to wake him up, then I called 911."
The cause of death was carbon monoxide poisoning. Jensen had complained to his co-workers that he felt dizzy and nauseous, but they all thought it was the flu.
Dennis Ferguson: "We all feel a little stupid we didn't recognize it as well."
Crews found carbon monoxide leaking from the boiler in the basement of the home.
Scott Frietag: "Something malfunctioned in there, there was a gasket that gave out, there was a crack. We would say this was a very preventable kind of death."
A detector would have caught one part per million of carbon monoxide in the air; in Jensen's house there were over 130 parts per million.
Scott Frietag: "Had he had a carbon monoxide detector, he would have been alerted days ago that there was a carbon monoxide problem."
The lesson from this tragedy: get a carbon monoxide detector and have your furnace checked regularly. |
