Jordanians warned over heater gas leaks as annual death toll rises to 29

A father mourns his son and bride killed by toxic gas heater on wedding night in Jordan.

Ahmad Huweitat reveals the agony of finding the bodies of his son, Sharif, and Sharif’s bride, the morning after they married.

ZARQA, JORDAN // It was supposed to be a happy time for the Huweitats. On December 17, Ahmad Huweitat married off his daughter, and one week later his son Sharif-Mohammad married a cousin, Ayat Kamal.

But the celebratory atmosphere did not last long. Sharif-Mohammad, 24, and Ayat, 16, were found dead in their apartment the day after their wedding.

The Civil Defence Department (CDD) said they died after they inhaled carbon monoxide emitted from a kerosene heater left on overnight.

It was a "terrible shock", Mr Huweitat, 57, said last week, while sitting in a funeral tent surrounded by grieving relatives. "We were preparing a heavy breakfast for them. Cheese, labaneh and fried liver. We were eager to wake them up since the early morning, but we left them to sleep," said Mr Huweitat, now a father of six after losing Sharif-Mohammad.

"At 11.30am my wife, daughter and one of my sons went and knocked on their door two, three and four times, but there was no response.

"We left them for a while, then I became worried. I banged on the door calling, 'Sharif, Sharif', and then I broke it. I saw Ayat, motionless, covered in a blanket. I shook her and said, 'Ayat, wake up', but then the fear of death gripped me," he said.

Their deaths were the fifth and sixth in December resulting from the misuse of gas and kerosene heaters in Jordan, Major Basem Khalaf, a CDD spokesman, said. Twenty-nine people died last year in such incidents.

On the same day the Huweitats died, there was a similar incident in Huwwarah, 85 kilometres north of Amman. Ali Riyad, a 20-year-old Syrian was found dead with his 16-year-old wife, Rana Adnan, and his 40-year-old mother, Rihab. They had inhaled toxic gas emitted from a gas heater.

Major Khalaf said that the deaths could have been prevented if people followed simple safety precautions.

He said the CDD increased safety education in the past two weeks since the deaths.

Though the number of deaths from such accidents rose in 2010, the number of non-fatal heater accidents has fallen. The CDD said there were 621 heater-related accidents last year compared with 1,065 in 2009.

"We have changed our approach in raising awareness in the wake of the recent accidents," Major Khalaf said.

"Now we tell citizens directly that the accidents occur because it is their fault … Now I make my language simple ... Carbon monoxide is an odourless, colourless gas and they cannot detect it. Therefore, it is a silent killer."

When it comes to heaters, he said "it is like having a Mercedes and a Fiat. They are both cars but they can turn to fatal machines when they are misused".

In an editorial on Wednesday, the Jordan Times called the figures released by the CDD "tragic", and said despite the advice by the CDD each year on how to avoid the accidents "there is no end to news of death because of heaters".

"The Ministry of Education might consider dedicating one class at the beginning of winter to informing students how to avoid heater-related death," the newspaper said.

Back at the funeral tent, Mr Huweitat did not want his son's death to be in vain.

"I wanted to warn others how small insignificant things can lead to a grave tragedy," he said.