Fire is truly one of those double-edged swords in life, providing warmth and many useful functions for human society while also being one of the most dangerous things that can ruin all in its path. You don’t want the ire of fire, basically. To prevent an unwanted spread of flames, you should be wary of these hazardous risks and know how to prevent them. At the very least, you should learn some of the important statistics.
Here are some of the biggest burning baddies you don’t want in your home:
Dryer vent fires
The National Fire Protection Association reported that over four years, one of the leading causes of home fires had been clothes dryers, particularly because of a failure to clean them properly. In fact, when it came to washing machines and dryers, dryers made up 92% of the cases. Among that, over a fourth of the fires were built-up in the dryers that weren’t cleaned.
The statistics may sound scary, but the solution is very simple. You need to make sure you get dryer vent cleaning regularly and that you personally monitor how much lint and grime gets caught up in there. Even though it does the job, it still needs to be maintained.
Faulty wiring
Electrical fires cause hundreds of deaths every year, and there are roughly over 50,000 reported annually. One of the most common reasons for electrical issues cropping up is faulty wiring. Over time, wear and tear get to the wiring throughout your house and can cause hazardous surges, especially if it makes a spark.
That’s just accounting for hidden wires behind sockets, too. Exposed wires you have via your appliances and such are another problem altogether, and if it isn’t grounded right, you may find yourself with a boom that causes flames. Since it may be harder to check on your inner wiring (being that they aren’t visible regularly), you’ll want to check out for signs like burning smells whenever your power is on or if your circuit breaker trips too frequently.
Abandoned cooking
Sometimes, we may forget something we were doing. That’s natural. However, that is a dangerous slip-up when it involves cooking. It’s bad enough to have a ruined dinner that is burnt beyond recognition and has to be thrown out as waste, but the dangers of forgetting something on the stove are very real to this day. For residential buildings, in particular, cooking was the leading cause of fires from 2014 to 2016.
When you’re cooking, make sure you are focused and don’t multitask with other chores or responsibilities. If you must leave something to simmer or boil and such, make sure you have a loud timer that you’ll be able to get back to quickly.
Overloaded plugs
When you get an electrical fault, it can be a device killer. But, when it causes fires, it can kill more than your PC or TV. You don’t want to overload your outlets, even when you have extension cables. If you hear crackling noises from the plugs, feel constant ground from appliances, or start seeing some char marks around outlets, it’s time to unplug some things as soon as possible.
You could also find that if your power-hogging appliances start randomly shutting off or your lights frequently dim or flicker, this is another warning sign that you are overloading your circuit. It’s good to know that different outlets have various connections that you should learn a bit more about so you can maximize the layout of your home without unwanted fires.
Stray cigarettes and candles
This has been an issue that has plagued people for ages, mostly because candles have been around so long, and people have been smoking for centuries. And yet, it still seems to be one of those things that slip our minds and end up causing a trickle of flames turning into a fire that can’t be contained.
Technically, smoking and candles are on the lower end of the spectrum in terms of house fire causes, but the trouble is that they can cause up to half of the injuries associated with fires. The combined death toll from smoking-caused and candle-caused fires also tallies up to about half of all house fire fatalities.
Knowing these statistics isn’t meant to cause anxiety. These are merely a reminder of why it’s important to be careful and vigilant even in our own homes, especially when playing with fire. This way, you can prevent dangerous situations from happening; you won’t be worried about too many things.
