Northborough's Police Cruisers And The Carbon Monoxide Concern

NORTHBOROUGH, MA—Last week, numerous cruisers in the Austin, TX, police department tested positive for high levels of carbon monoxide in the vehicles. The issue prompted Ford to issue a statement that it would fix any of these Ford Explorer models that are experiencing issues.

On Wednesday, the issue popped up in Massachusetts, with an Auburn officers passing out and crashing into another vehicle because of high levels of carbon monoxide in his Ford Explorer police SUV.
It prompted not only a flurry of media attention, but also concern that swept police departments across the state.

In Northborough, there are five Ford Explorer (Interceptor) SUVs in the police department's fleet, the same models that have been reported to have carbon monoxide issues.

"This is an issue of great concern," said Northborough Police Chief William Lyver. "When your office for eight hours per day is a vehicle, it has to be safe."

Lyver said that the department has been monitoring the issue in the media and in police publications. All of Northborough's vehicles have medical kits equipped with personal CO monitors attached to the exterior of the bag.

The intended purpose of the monitors, explains Lyver, is to protect officers responding to an unknown medical call in a home, building, vehicle or confined space where a victim or victims may be unresponsive. Should the cause of the emergency be due to high levels of carbon monoxide, the alarm on the medical bag activates warning the officers to leave the area until fire personnel with SCBA arrive.

"Recently, officers have reported that when the vehicles are under rapid acceleration the CO alarms activate inside the car, clearly indicating an unsafe CO level," said Lyver. "Within a short time of backing off the acceleration the alarms stop, most likely due to the exchange of air through the ventilation system and opening windows. Under normal driving conditions there have been no problems. Additionally, officers leave the environmental controls on fresh air intake."

Lyver has discussed the issue with Fire Chief David Parenti testing with more sophisticated equipment is planned for this week.

"My intention is to put the Fire Department gas meters in the cars and drive under simulated conditions and measure the CO levels," said Lyver. "I am also contacting our vehicle vendor to report our CO alarm activations and seek a remedy through them."

"Safety is our top priority and we are concerned for those involved," said a spokesperson from Ford in response to the Auburn issue. "We are working with the Auburn Police Department and have a team in Massachusetts on the way to inspect their vehicles and modifications made to them. It’s premature to draw conclusions from what happened in Auburn after reports of carbon monoxide at levels of 13 parts per million in the vehicle. According to the Massachusetts Environmental Affairs, ‘most people do not begin to feel the effects of carbon monoxide poisoning until they have been exposed to levels of at least 200 parts per million for several hours or more.’ Given this discrepancy, more investigating is required.”

Photo Credit: Charlene Arsenault