As the holiday season nears, thoughts turn to wonderful home-cooked meals with family. Few things in life are more pleasurable than a traditional holiday turkey feast. Yet for an unfortunate few, holiday meal time can turn tragic if a turkey frying accident occurs. While fried turkeys may be tasty, many fire safety experts feel that the reward is not worth the risk. (more…)
Statistics predict that about half grill owners will be firing them up this upcoming Memorial Day weekend [i]. Let’s look over a propane grill, as if we had just pulled it out for the grilling season, for some tips and red flags. Not beef tips or how to get the perfect sear on your steak – safety tips! Besides hot surfaces, a gas grill serves up hazards related to flammable gases: fires, explosions, and flash fires. (more…)
As the Holiday Season approaches in the United States, it is a good time to take a look at several ways that the festivities can go awry.
For people that have cool or cold weather during winter, the thought of a warm, cozy home can be very comforting. However, many of the things that come to mind can turn the season on its head very quickly. Candles are a great example of a decorating trend with potentially serious side effects. The good folks at the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) tell us that more than one-third of home decoration fires are started by candles, with more than two of every five decoration fires occurring because decorations were placed too close to a heat source. One fire I responded to as a firefighter occurred because (more…)
As the temperature outside slides from the cold to the “bitter” cold range on the thermometer, most people tend to turn the heat on inside their home. Some homes, however, do not have whole house heat or sufficient heating capacity and therefore the occupants may rely on portable space heaters. Portable space heaters, used properly, can be a good choice to warm a small area of a home. Unfortunately, while they can warm your cold and tingling hands and feet, they can also warm nearby materials to the point of ignition. (more…)
Previously, Warren posted the first installment of a series on losses associated with heating systems. The first article looked at central forced air furnaces. This new article will look at a common form of supplemental or secondary heat, oil filled electric radiant heaters. These heaters are commonly used to provide extra heating in areas that are lacking in central heating capacity. Another rationale for their use arises from manufacturer’s claims that the portable heating units can lower your power bill. This is based on (more…)
In the old-timey Fire Triangle, you have heat, fuel, and oxygen. Get these three together in the right quantities, and you get fire. What if the fuel provides its own heat? That’s spontaneous combustion, or spontaneous ignition. NFPA921 defines this as “initiation of combustion of a material by an internal chemical or biological reaction that has produced sufficient heat to ignite the material.” (more…)
The fire service affords you the opportunity to witness and observe things that a lot of engineers and even most people do not get the chance to see. An example of this is the situation where extended elevated temperatures combined with poor construction techniques to result in a structure fire.
I have personally observed several occasions where a structure fire was initiated due to improper construction of the fireplace hearth extension. The most recent one followed a multi-day cold snap, at least by South Carolina standards. The thermometer read 17 degrees F as I drove to the call of smoke in a residence (more…)
The winter season is well underway in the United States, with the Christmas and New Years holidays behind us and the depths of cold weather here for the duration. With winter, many people spend more hours indoors as compared to the summer when outdoor activities ramp up. With more time spent indoors, it is somewhat intuitive that the use of electricity would increase as well.
Electricity is one of the most influential utilities in our daily life. Much of what modern societies rely on to get through a normal day requires electricity. Have you ever been in a slight panic looking for an electric outlet when your cell phone is below 10% charge? Or how many times do we all attempt to turn on a light switch when we enter a room during a known power outage from sheer habit? Even our personal transportation which has relied on gasoline for roughly 100 years is shifting toward electric automobiles. (more…)
When fall and winter arrive and temperatures drop, it is a great comfort to have a heating system to warm your home or office. Several categories of heating equipment exist to provide both primary and secondary heating. Primary heating systems include fuel gas/fuel oil/electric forced air furnaces, heat pumps, hydronic heating/steam systems and even wood-fired heating systems. Secondary heating equipment includes electric, gas and kerosene space heaters of both fixed and portable design, and fireplaces. Each of the different types of heating systems have unique hazards that, uncontrolled, can result in fires, explosions, burn injuries, and carbon monoxide poisoning. (more…)
If there is one thing Americans can agree upon, it is the enjoyment that comes from an outdoor barbeque. Whether a summertime cookout or a fall BBQ to watch a football game, we all love the fun and fellowship that comes from sharing a meal that was prepared outdoors on a grill or smoker. In fact, 64% of Americans own a grill or smoker. The great majority of these are LP fueled gas grills with comparatively few natural gas fired grills. These products can be enjoyed safely when designed, installed, and used in a proper manner. However, given the grill’s use of flammable fuel gas and high temperatures, the potential exists for things to go wrong and result in burn injuries or uncontained fires that spread to the surroundings. (more…)
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