How to protect your family from garage door injuries

It may not be something most people think of, but garage doors can pose a risk to small children. In the 1980s, dozens of children were killed when automatic garage doors crushed them. Technology has greatly decreased the number of garage door-related deaths and accidents considerably, but the threat is not completely gone.

To make sure your young children stay safe, remember some of these tips:

– Install the garage door switches high enough so it is out of reach of children. Keep garage door remotes away from them as well.
– Teach them that it is not a toy. Sometimes kids are injured by touching the rails and other hardware by a moving garage door. To prevent injuries all together, small children should avoid it completely.
– Test your garage door at least once a month. Garage doors made after 1982 must be able to reverse on contact. You can test this by putting a two by four on the ground. The doors should reverse within two seconds after contact or stop before hitting it at all. If it does not, then disconnect the operator and call a professional to repair it.
– Make sure the door is balanced. An unbalanced door will drop and can cause serious injury.

To keep your family safe around garage doors, please test your doors for balance and reversibility. If it fails either, contact the Austin 24-hour garage door repair specialists of Cowart Door Systems at (512) 459-3467.