``Elderly people sleep sounder, and they're less agile,'' State Fire Marshal Ray Lambert said. ``Frankly, we have a high number of elderly people who live alone and they do not have a smoke detector or one that works. That's a sad fact.''
The Federal Emergency Management Agency says 87 people died in house fires in North Dakota from 1989 to 1998. Twenty-one of the deaths, or 24 percent, were people 65 or older, the agency said. The national average is 31.4 percent.
The agency's report released Thursday, is part of a national campaign to encourage elderly people to be careful when cooking, smoking or using heaters in their homes. The agency said those are the primary causes of fire-related deaths in North Dakota and the nation.
The report puts the risk of dying in a residential house fire for seniors in North Dakota at one in 44,414 - compared to one in 83,431 for people under age 65.
Lambert said there is no specific safety program to address the hazard. But he said a statewide safety campaign could be started in the future to target senior citizens.
``We are certainly going to analyze this,'' Lambert said. ``We are aware that nationally, a high percentage of the elderly - and the very young - are more likely to die in structural fires.
Between 2000 and 2003, five of North Dakota's 34 residential fire fatalities involved residents aged 65 and older, Lambert said.
Most of the residential fire deaths since 2000 have involved people from their mid-20s to 50, Lambert said. Alcohol use was a factor in several of those deaths, he said.
