Foundation to give away furnaces in fight against carbon monoxide poisoning

Amanda Hansen would have been 22 today, a graduate of the University of North Carolina working as a Spanish teacher, said her father Ken Hansen of West Seneca.

She wanted to be a Tar Heel, Hansen said, referring to the nickname for University of North Carolina students.

But the 16-year-old high school student died of carbon monoxide poisoning from a defective boiler during a sleepover at the home of a friend in 2009. The swimmer with a sunny smile also wanted to help others, former classmates said.

Thats why Amanda would have been tickled by the furnace drive her parents mounted to help homeowners who cannot afford to replace their faulty furnaces.

In the past year, with the assistance of friends and heating companies, the Amanda Hansen Foundation has collected 17 furnaces to be donated to area families.

The first furnace was installed last January in the home of Candee Camillo, a Town of Tonawanda single mother of two.

Thomas Tarnowski, a single father of three, received a furnace after a flood swept through his Lackawanna home and ruined a 40-year-old furnace he could not afford to replace.

Ken and Kim Hansen established the foundation in 2010, one year after their daughters death. They started by donating carbon monoxide detectors. The nonprofit organization has worked to raise awareness and funds to prevent deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning.

From 1999 to 2004, an average of 439 people died annually from unintentional, non-fire-related carbon monoxide poisoning in the United States, according to the National Center for Environmental Health. In New York State, approximately 200 people are hospitalized each year because of accidental carbon monoxide poisoning.

From 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, the foundation will kick off carbon dioxide awareness month at Amandas high school, West Seneca West, on 3330 Seneca St., by giving away its 17,000th detector. As a rule, Hansen said, carbon monoxide detectors are good for five years.

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Foundation to give away furnaces in fight against carbon monoxide poisoning