Smoke alarms are designed to pick up on other fumes in the home besides smoke. These could be toxic (such as carbon monoxide leaking from a faulty boiler or gas appliance) or non-toxic (such as steam coming from the home’s bathrooms or kitchen area). So, while it’s very important to install smoke alarms in your home, you won’t want them to be triggered by steam from your kitchen – that would make it a misleading false alarm. Install heat detectors in your kitchen and keep the smoke detectors for the landings and hallways – anywhere that would be used as an evacuation route if there were to be a fire-related incident in the home.
