Daylight Saving Time ends this weekend as clocks "fall back" an hour at 2 a.m. on Sunday.
The time change is used as a reminder for people to change the batteries in their smoke and CO alarms.
"Fire departments everywhere always say that when you change your clocks, change your batteries. It's just a good reminder with smoke and CO alarms that require batteries," said Sarnia Fire Public Education Officer Mike Otis.
It's also a reminder to check if your alarms need to be replaced.
"Change the whole alarm every 10 years, sooner if required. That includes hardwired alarms. Even if they're hardwired into your home, they need to be replaced every 10 years," said Otis. "A lot of the newer alarms have a spot on the side to write the date on, and if you don't have the date written on the side, you can pull down the alarm, look on the top, and it'll have a manufacturer's date. It's 10 years from that date that it needs to be replaced."
As of January 2026, every floor of your home needs to have a working smoke and CO alarm. If you are a tenant, your landlord is responsible for making sure they're in working order and up to date.
Otis noted that if you notice your landlord has not been keeping up with the alarms in your unit, contact the fire department.
"If you have any issues with landlords, call us immediately. We will deal with it that day. We don't want anybody vulnerable. We don't want anybody going to sleep without working smoke and CO alarm protection," he said.
There are penalties for landlords who are not keeping their rental units up to code.
"It's the law; we don't allow landlords to not put those in for the tenants. We will take care of the issue; the minimum fine per alarm is $360 per alarm. So it's cheaper for a landlord to buy the alarms they're supposed to have than to get fined $360 times however many alarms they're missing. We will contact the landlords or whatever we have to do to remedy the situation."
People are encouraged to test their alarms monthly and to buy new alarms from reputable sellers.
The first week of November also marks CO Awareness Week. CO poisoning is the leading cause of accidental death in Canada.
