A young couple who were just hours away from possible death from carbon monoxide poisoning have urged people to check for the “silent killer”.

Sarah Conway and Ben Petty, both 22, had to be rushed to Bradford Royal Infirmary from their home in St Enoch’s Road, Wibsey, after they discovered the gas leaking from their boiler was making them ill.

They had been ill for the previous two days with flu-like symptoms – and could have died if they had not borrowed a carbon monoxide alarm from Sarah’s grandmother.

Sarah, who works in IT for the Yorkshire Building Society, said: “It’s scary because your home is where you think you want to be to get better, but this is where it was happening.

“It was just no different to feeling like you’ve got flu. That’s literally all I thought, I’ll just sleep it off, and that’s the worst thing to do.

“You would not know, unless you had that alarm. That is the only thing that told us – there was no other sign.”

The couple started suffering flu-like symptoms on Tuesday and were told to rest by their doctor.

Throughout Wednesday they continued to suffer from migraines, dizziness and were falling in and out of sleep.

Sarah said: “My mum came and asked if we had checked the carbon monoxide levels.

“We hadn’t so my mum brought the alarm from my grandma’s house and after two minutes it went off.”

The pair were rushed to Bradford Royal Infirmary by ambulance where they were treated for the effects of carbon monoxide.

Ben, who works for the Pensions Trust, said the boiler was old but it had been serviced last year.

He said: “We spoke to the gas board afterwards and they said if we had stayed there overnight we probably wouldn’t have woken up on Thursday morning. You can’t smell it and you can’t see it – it’s called the silent killer.”

e-mail: james.rush@telegraphandargus.co.uk

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