All of my apartments now have 10 year smoke alarms. The batteries are sealed inside and cannot be removed without tearing the alarm apart and destroying it. If you find a smoke alarm in your unit that has a battery door and a removable 9-volt battery inside, let me know, and I will replace it with a 10 year smoke alarm. You should test all the smoke and carbon monoxide alarms in your home regularly. If one of them fails to sound an alarm when your press and hold the test button, let me know, and I will replace it. I know that smoke alarms near kitchens have an unpleasant habit of going off when people are cooking. The smoke alarm in my hall goes off whenever I broil anything, and it is very annoying. If you remove a smoke alarm from your wall when if goes off while you are cooking, please remember to put it back in place as soon as you are done. Most of the time when a smoke alarm fails to sound during a fire, it turns out that the reason was that the tenant had disabled the alarm or removed the battery. A U.C. Berkeley student was killed in a fire precisely that way a few years ago. He was sleeping at a friend’s house after a party and died from smoke inhalation. The smoke alarm didn’t go off because a tenant had removed the battery.