Facts on House Fires

Video Transcript

"The leading cause of house fires in the United states is cooking. Cooking related fires are the number one cause of house fires in the United States. Second to that is from heat sources, either open flame sources or malfunctioning heating/air-conditioning systems. Those are the 2 leading causes of house fires. Heating sources, making sure that your equipment is in good shape. If you're using auxiliary heat, like kerosene heaters or wood stoves or things like that, making sure that you don't have combustible materials stored too close to those, making sure that they're not next to beds or curtains or things like that, that are subject to being engulfed in flames. If it's a cooking source, then obvious things, making sure that you don't leave pots unattended on the stove, making sure that you don't start the oven or the stove and then leave home and forget about it. If you're cooking on the stove, making sure that if you have a grease fire, you have a fire extinguisher close by. Just knowing basic safety precautions; don't lay towels on top of your stove. Things that might be subject to burn, you should keep them away from the stove. Anywhere that you have potential causes of fire, you should keep a fire extinguisher close by. You should at least check them regularly. If you have ones that are refillable, then they need to be serviced annually. If you have ones that are disposable, you just need to make sure that the indicator valves stays within the good range, whatever that is for the particular fire extinguisher."