With the change to Daylight Savings Time this weekend, public safety officials are urging people to take steps to avoid fire deaths.
Westfield, Massachusetts Fire Chief Mary Regan urged people when they change the time on their clocks this weekend to change the batteries in smoke and carbon monoxide alarms.
"Smoke detectors are only going to work if they have the batteries to operate, and what we are finding is a lot of the fires we are going into there are not working smoke alarms," said Regan.
The Massachusetts Fire Marshall’s office urged people to help elderly neighbors and relatives change smoke alarm batteries. The office reported that half of the 12 people killed in fires so far in 2015 were over age 65.