Winter Safety

Old man win­ter is final­ly here, leav­ing it’s mark with freez­ing tem­per­a­tures and treach­er­ous dri­ving con­di­tions.  We’ve already wit­nessed the below zero tem­per­a­tures and the ice and snow mix in and around the city.  We can also see that just recent­ly, the U.S was hit with a mas­sive ice storm, dev­as­tat­ing 16 states. Time to think of win­ter safe­ty.

As the win­ter sea­son swings into full gear, it’s time to pre­pare your car for the win­ter sea­son ahead.  One way to so is by con­sid­er­ing get­ting snow tires installed on your car.  If you’ve used snow tires in the past, then you know how much safer and effec­tive they are when it comes to dri­ving in win­ter con­di­tions.  How­ev­er, if you’ve nev­er used win­ter tires before, there are a few rea­sons to con­sid­er their use this sea­son.  The mate­r­i­al used in win­ter tires are a more flex­i­ble com­pound that is designed to work at a low­er tem­per­a­ture and pre­vent snow from build­ing up in the tire grooves unlike all-sea­son tires where the rub­ber quick­ly stiff­ens upon cold tem­per­a­tures, fail­ing to deliv­er opti­mal per­for­mance in some dri­ving con­di­tions.  Fur­ther­more, the grooves on snow tires are much larg­er and deep­er unlike those on all-sea­son tires, pre­vent­ing a build-up of snow and allow­ing for the tires to main­tain their grip on the road.

As we know, Cana­di­an win­ters are known for their harsh cli­mates, as tem­per­a­tures can drop in a cou­ple of days to quick changes in the weath­er pat­terns.  That’s why this win­ter remem­ber to bun­dle up.  Any­time you go out, whether it’s to school, work, shop­ping or vis­it­ing fam­i­ly, remem­ber to put on those scarves, hats, jack­ets and gloves to pro­tect your­self from the harsh win­ter winds and from the pos­si­bil­i­ty of get­ting frost­bite.  Try not to take small chil­dren, babies or the elder­ly out­side dur­ing freez­ing tem­per­a­tures as you would­n’t want them to catch a cold.  If it’s just too cold out­side, stay at home.  There’s no bet­ter way to beat the cold than avoid­ing the expo­sure to it.

Last­ly, don’t for­get to pre­pare your house for the win­ter sea­son.  Clean out all rain gut­ters, mak­ing sure that any melt­ed snow or water can drain through eas­i­ly.  Seal up all cracks in any doors and win­dows to stop cold air or snow from leak­ing into the house and sweep the chim­ney, makes sure noth­ing is block­ing its air flow before using the fire­place.  In addi­tion, since the hol­i­day sea­son will mean that peo­ple will be in and out of their house a lot, make sure that your alarm sys­tem is armed and active.  Change the bat­ter­ies in your alarm sys­tem to allow for opti­mal per­for­mance and exam­ine all exter­nal secu­ri­ty cam­eras, check­ing for any dam­ages.  Remem­ber, it only takes min­utes for a bur­glar to break into your home, so pro­tect you and your home this hol­i­day sea­son.  If you don’t have an alarm sys­tem, call us, PROTECTION PLUS ®, and see how easy and afford­able Smart Home Ser­vices, an Alarm Mon­i­tor­ing Plan and Video Sur­veil­lance can be to pro­tect your fam­i­ly this hol­i­day.

As win­ter con­tin­ues to make its pres­ence felt, it’s impor­tant to be pre­pared for just about any­thing.  Stay safe this win­ter sea­son and if you’re not a fan of win­ter, then let the count­down to sum­mer begin.