HowStuffWorks Videos "How to Survive: Fire"

HowStuffWorks Videos "How to Survive: Fire"

Whether it's a house or forest fire, you've got precious little time to react to a blaze. This video from Discovery Channel's "How to Survive" outlines the best ways to get out safely.

Toddler dies after being pulled from Clifton fire - The Delaware County Daily Times : Serving Delaware County, PA(DelcoTimes.com)

Toddler dies after being pulled from Clifton fire - The Delaware County Daily Times : Serving Delaware County, PA(DelcoTimes.com)
CLIFTON HEIGHTS — A 16-month-old baby boy rescued by firefighters from a burning row home early Friday in the borough later died of apparent smoke inhalation, police said.

Borough police initially arrived about 3:25 a.m. and observed heavy smoke and fire inside the home at 120 W. Berkley Ave., said police Chief Walter Senkow.

The father, identified as Thomas Pierce, and two older children were able to escape the blaze. The child’s mother was at work at the time, Senkow said.

Pierce and neighbors attempted to save the child, but were thwarted by heavy smoke. Firefighters gained entry and found the child in a crib in a second-floor bedroom, according to Senkow and borough fire Chief Jim Kneass.

Fire investigators warn of the dangers of improperly installed wood-burning stoves

Fire investigators warn of the dangers of improperly installed wood-burning stoves - Michigan News, Updates, Photos & Video | Detroit, Lansing - MLive.com

VANDALIA -- A Michigan State Police investigator who has probed three fatal house fires this year sparked by wood-burning stoves said residents should always have the devices installed and regularly maintained by a professional to ensure safety.

Two young brothers in Cass County who perished Monday in a fire Monday morning were the fourth and fifth person this year in southwestern Michigan to die in a fire that Sgt. Scott LeRoy has determined was caused by a wood stove. LeRoy said improper installation or maintenance is often a factor when wood stoves are to blame for a blaze.

I think one of the contributing factors with these (recent fires) is ... homeowners or friends are installing or reinstalling wood stoves and chimneys and, quite frankly, making errors," LeRoy said.

For example, the sergeant said a recently installed wood stove that sparked a Feb. 16 fire in Delton and killed 35-year-old Jason Hoffman had been improperly placed on a wood floor instead of a non-combustible surface such as bricks. A new stove was also blamed for a Feb. 10 fire that killed 84-year-old Grace Bower and her son, Donald Bower, 60, at their Burr Oak home.

In the fire Monday that killed 6-year-old Dale Baldwin and 13-year-old Scott Baldwin, LeRoy said a wood stove that was used as a primary heat source "most likely" was the cause.

He said the boys' father, Leonard Baldwin had recently performed some maintenance on the stove's chimney, but Tuesday police did not know if those improvements were a contributing factor in the wood stove igniting the blaze.

Brad Friedt, owner of Friedt Enterprises in Kalamazoo, which specializes in wood stove sales and maintenance, said homeowners should have the pipes of their wood stove and chimney checked monthly and cleaned yearly. Friedt said the most common issue his company finds during wood stove inspections is improper clearance around stove and chimney pipes.

In some instances, he said company officials have inspected stoves where chimney pipes traveling through a ceiling of a home butt up against wood in the attic area and present a potential fire hazard.

Friedt said pipe traveling from a stove up to a ceiling should have an 18-inch clearance all around and a two-inch clearance is needed from where pipe travels from the ceiling through a home's rooftop.

The fire Monday gutted most of the house at 60969 Storey Road. Penn Township firefighters responded to the blaze at about 12:25 a.m. and found Dale and Scott dead inside after extinguishing the flames.

Leonard Baldwin, his girlfriend Billie Jo Allen and six other children made it out of the house safely. Alyia Baldwin, 7, was flown to Bronson Methodist Hospital in Kalamazoo, where she was listed in good condition Tuesday morning.

LeRoy said the family slept in the single-story portion of the house where the wood stove was located. Dale and Scott were found by firefighters in the dining room of the house, which adjoined to the living room where they slept, he said.

By the time one of the Baldwin children spotted the fire early Monday, LeRoy said "the fire was already well involved" and family members who made their way to safety "barely got out."

LeRoy said police found one to two smoke detectors in the house, but none had batteries. He said police continue to investigate the blaze, but have no indications of anything suspicious and plan to close the investigation, pending the results of autopsies of Dale and Scott.

Five Children Die in Ark House Fire

Five children who were asleep in the upstairs of a small Bentonville home died early Tuesday in a fire that swept through the home.

Fire Chief Dan White says the children's parents were in a downstairs bedroom and were awakened by a smoke alarm, but could not reach the children because of the smoke and flames.

The parents escaped from the blaze, which was reported at 1:22 a.m.

White says the fire appears to be accidental, but police served a search warrant on the home later today based on items officers saw during the initial call. Among the items seized were a space heater and a small amount of suspected methamphetamine. Officers say there was not enough meth on hand to indicate there was a lab in the home.

The children were identified as 13-year-old Kristan Frazier, 11-year-old Kimberly Frazier, 9-year-old Katelyn Mahmens, 8-year-old Kaila Frazier, and 5-year-old Kiya Frazier.

Authorities identified the father as 33-year-old Jamie Dale Frazier, and the mother as 27-year-old Kerry A. Mahmens Frazier.

The bodies of the children were being sent to the state Crime Laboratory in Little Rock for autopsy. Police say the items seized during the search will also be sent to the lab to be analyzed.

Fire officials described the house as 11/2 stories, with a very narrow stairway leading to the upstairs. White says he had to turn sideways to get through to the second floor.

Old smoke alarm may have led to woman's death in fire

News: Old smoke alarm may have led to woman's death in fire | alarms, smoke, fire, believe, power - OCRegister.com
Will your 10-year-old smoke alarm fail you?

Investigators say 60-year-old might have escaped her San Juan Capistrano home if her 35-year-old alarm had been operating.

This was sent to me courtesy of Jim C in the online class. Jim comments:

(This)kind of goes along with (our discussion of)complacency.

How many of us took the time to replace the batteries in our smoke detectors in our homes while we were changing our clocks for daylight savings? Put a new one if it needs it or not. If it is older, replace it. If you don’t have one, get one.

We should all take a little tour of our own homes now and again and make them safer and easier to escape from. Fire prevention starts at home. Check out the link, it’s a sad thing to think about a $10 device could have changed the outcome for this family.

I think Jim makes a very valid argument. Read the story and see what you think. The link to the original story has more photos and lots of worthwhile info on smoke detectors.

Thanks Jim!

SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO – It may have been a fire burning in the floor below Rita Sales' bedroom that killed her, but investigators believe it was a smoke alarm that failed her.

The 60-year-old woman and her dog were in the bedroom when the fire began smoldering in the family room at 10 p.m. Jan. 25, officials said. It took firefighters about an hour to put out the blaze in the two-story home in the 33600 block of Avenida Calita, but investigators believe Sales might have been able to get out if the smoke alarm outside her bedroom had worked.

"We don't believe the smoke alarms were activated," said Chief Investigator Devin Leonard of the Orange County Fire Authority.

Investigators believe Sales' home was equipped with the same hard-wired smoke alarms that were included when the home was first built in 1973. Although the smoke alarms should be replaced every eight to 10 years, officials believe that most of the 400-plus homes in the same tract, like Sales' home, are using the same, ineffective alarms.

This Saturday, about a dozen firefighters are expected to be sent door to door in the tract where Sales lived to inform residents about the need to replace smoke alarms that could be more than 30 years old. The simple practice of replacing the alarms and checking the battery power could save lives, said Laura Blaul, Fire Authority fire marshal.

Hard-wired smoke alarms are connected to the home's power supply and use a battery as a backup. Although batteries should be replaced every six months, the entire smoke alarm needs to be replaced every 10 years. Because they are connected to the home itself, many homeowners have an incorrect notion that hard-wired alarms don't have to be replaced, like battery-power-only detectors, she said.

In the past six years, about 70 percent of fires in the county have been in homes equipped with ineffective smoke alarms, Blaul said.

Click HERE to read the rest of the story. It has lots of good info in it!

Escape auction

Another oldie but a goodie~ Enjoy!

Chelsea Handler's Exit Drill

Chelsea Handler suffers a "wardrobe malfunction" and other problems during a surprise fire drill.

Baby Tossed From Burning Building By Dad

LiveLeak.com - Baby Tossed From Burning Building By Dad: "Pepperdine"
What is wrong w/this plan?

Ohio House Fire Kills Woman, 3 Children

The Associated Press: Ohio House Fire Kills Woman, 3 Children

TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) — A fire started by a candle swept through a two-story house, killing a woman and three children, fire officials said.

The woman's body was found on the lower level. The children, two girls and a younger boy, were found together in an upstairs hallway, according to fire officials.

"They may have become disoriented and tried to huddle together and tried to get out," said Deputy Fire Chief Luis Santiago.

The fire started around 10 p.m. on Wednesday and was contained within an hour, according to fire officials. Authorities said it appeared there were no smoke detectors in the house.

Neighbor Mike Matzinger, 49, said he was doing dishes when he saw flames shooting out the home's first-floor living room window and ran outside. He tried to break through a steel back door but it was locked and wouldn't budge, so he called to the children, who he thought were upstairs.

Matzinger said he yelled for them to come to the back window so he could catch them, but they never came.

He then ran to the front of the house, where a man who lives there was outside without shoes, screaming, "My kids, my kids, they're in the house." Matzinger told him, "We can't get them out."

The man ran toward the home, where flames and smoke were pouring out the windows, and collapsed as if in shock, Matzinger said. The man was taken away by ambulance, but his condition was not known.

The fire blackened the walls and ceilings of the home, melted its plastic siding and charred its wood frame. It also melted the siding of Matzinger's home a driveway away.

Newspaper Carrier Alerts Family to Fire

The Associated Press: Newspaper Carrier Alerts Family to Fire

File this under...we don't need no stinkin' smoke detector!

LENOIR CITY, Tenn. (AP) — A family in eastern Tennessee credits a newspaper carrier with saving their lives from a fire that was consuming their log cabin — and they weren't even subscribers.

"I know that woman will be rewarded in heaven one day," Charlene Dunsmore said of the 29-year-old carrier, Carston Jane McKee.

McKee was driving her route for The Knoxville News Sentinel on Saturday morning when she spotted flames on the porch of the Dunsmores' home on a country road. She was about 45 minutes earlier than usual because of an early press run.

McKee called 911 but didn't wait for a response.

"I ran to the log cabin and started beating on the windows," she said. "As soon as the lady opened up the front door, the fire was right next to the door."

Dunsmore, her husband, Shawn, and their 8-year-old son, James Paul "J. P." Dunsmore, fled the house barefoot but unscathed, though their two poodles died in the blaze, which quickly swept through their two-year-old home.

"We can't thank her enough," Shawn Dunsmore's aunt, Mary Ruth Dunsmore, said of McKee. "She went above and beyond. They're alive today because of what she did."

McKee remained at the scene for nearly an hour answering authorities' questions before resuming her paper route.

"It could have been anybody," she said.

The Associated Press: NC Fire Survivor Recounts Narrow Escape

The Associated Press: NC Fire Survivor Recounts Narrow Escape
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Fallon Sposato awoke to a blaring alarm and smoke seeping into the first-floor bedroom of the beach house where she and 12 friends had been partying just hours earlier. With her lungs and eyes burning, she ran with her boyfriend through the smoke-filled house, assuming her friends were already outside.

"And then nobody else was out yet," the 19-year-old University of South Carolina sophomore recalled during an interview with The Associated Press on Tuesday.

Seven students died in the blaze. Six others made it out of the house in Ocean Isle Beach, N.C., into the arms of neighbors and rescue workers.

"We were all hysterical. They were holding us back, trying to get our friends," said Sposato, a native of Orlando, Fla.

On Tuesday, officials at the University of South Carolina and in Ocean Isle Beach officially identified those killed in the fire: Cassidy Fae Pendley, 18; Lauren Astrid Kristiana Mahon, 18; Justin Michael Anderson, 19; Travis Lane Cale, 19; Allison Walden, 19; William Rhea, 18; and Emily Lauren Yelton, 19.

The group partied into the early morning on the back deck. Sposato said she was the first to go to bed, turning in at 4:30 a.m. after calling her father to say she had lost her camera.

Several hours later, Sposato and her boyfriend, whom she declined to identify, awoke to the alarms, flames and smoke. Called by neighbors who saw the fire, emergency personnel were pulling up when she got out of the house, Sposato said. Several hours later, Sposato would learn her roommate was among the dead.

Another student who made it out of the burning house told ABC's "Good Morning America" on Tuesday that he decided to jump into the canal behind the house to escape his smoke-filled upper-floor room.

"You knew you had to jump at some point; that was the only option," Tripp Wylie said on the show.

Dog Saves Family From Fire Blamed on Cat

GREENVILLE, Maine (AP) — Thumper, a black Labrador retriever, is getting credit for saving a Greenville man when a fire swept through his home.

Roland Cote said his wife and their 7-year-old grandson were away when the blaze started early Sunday in a converted two-story garage. He said Thumper grabbed him by the arm to wake him, leaving just enough time for him to dial 911 before fleeing the fast-moving fire.

While the dog is the hero, a cat is the bad guy in this story.

Cote said the fire marshal investigator believes the blaze was started when Princess, the family cat, tipped over a kerosene lantern. Cote says he and his pets escaped safely, but he says Princess did get her tail singed by the flames.

Check out the video....Not the same story...but close!

Teens' debut sex interrupted by fire

Teens' debut sex interrupted by fire | NEWS.com.au

A TEENAGE couple having sex for the first time were interrupted when candles set fire to the girl's attic bedroom and forced them to flee naked from her parents' house, German daily Bild reported today.

The girl had wanted to create a romantic atmosphere for the occasion. But when the room suddenly became engulfed with flames, they had to make a hasty escape.

The couple, both 18, were pictured naked in the paper among the burned wreckage of the attic.

A charred teddy had survived but the fire wrecked the entire top floor of the house causing around $168,000 worth of damage.

Now that's hot!!! roflmao

Dane Cook talks about Firemen and Policemen

Adult language. 2:12

Fire set by grounded boy killed his brother

A 15-year-old boy who killed his little brother by setting fire to the family home as revenge for being grounded, was sentenced to at least ten years imprisonment today.

Matthew Stringer, who was 14 at the time, had been caught stealing thousands of pounds from his older brother and was angry at the punishment dished out by his family who had also confiscated his Xbox computer console.

Stringer poured white spirit in the hall and stairway of his house in Wombwell, near Barnsley, before igniting the fire with a match. Sheffield Crown Court heard that he watched “impassively” as his panicked family tried to escape the house.

His mother, sister, two elder brothers and one of their girlfriends, who was six months pregnant, were forced to jump from upstairs windows to escape the blaze. One of the older brothers broke both his ankles and his badly burned mother spent a number of months in hospital as a result of the fire on November 3 last year.

In the rush to flee the burning building nobody noticed that the youngest brother Adam was still in his room. His body was found by firefighters in his badly charred bed, he died of smoke inhalation while sleeping under the covers still wearing his brand new headphones.

The court heard that Stringer’s behaviour had deteriorated in the months leading up to the fire. In October he told a friend at school that he was planning to burn down his house to kill his mother after she had grounded him.

Since his parents separated in August 2005, Matthew Stringer had lit fires in a skip, a field and a garden shed. He had also used a cigarette lighter to cause burns to his hands.

Two firefighters among four killed in San Pablo fire

San Jose Mercury News - Two firefighters among four killed in San Pablo fire They were caught in the flashover while attempting to rescue the occupants.

SAN PABLO, Calif.—An early-morning house fire Saturday killed four people, including two firefighters trapped by surging flames while trying to rescue one of the home's residents, authorities said.
Fire Captain Matt C. Burton, 34, of Concord and Fire Engineer Scott P. Desmond, 37, of Brentwood died in the blaze that broke out around 1:45 a.m., said Emily Hopkins, spokeswoman for the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District.

A 67-year-old man and a 62-year-old woman who lived in the San Pablo house also died in the blaze. Their names were not yet released.

One of the residents had already been found when the firefighters plunged back into the burning building to find the other person.

Firefighters on the scene then "heard kind of a whoosh sound, and the fire started going through the rooms," Contra Costa Fire Chief Keith Richter said. "That trapped the firefighters."

The men were wearing standard safety equipment when they were caught in a "flashover" in which hot gasses trapped in a burning structure ignite in a sudden burst of flame, Richter said.

Another reason to plan your escape!

Sons that Dad ‘forgot’ in fire

icWales - Sons that Dad ‘forgot’ in fire
Another tragic story. Click here for more information on Alchohol and Fire Death Rates.

A FATHER-OF-TWO who had been drinking before a blaze tore through his flat “forgot” his young sons were asleep in a bedroom, an inquest was told yesterday.

After he had left his home to raise the alarm the lifeless bodies of Konnor Owen, three, and brother Kyal, four, were recovered by firefighters.

At an inquest into the tragedy yesterday their father Michael Thomas admitted he may have fallen asleep while a cigarette was still alight following a drinking session at the property with two friends. North West Wales coroner Dewi Pritchard Jones, recording a verdict of accidental death, said though it was not the job of an inquest to apportion blame it was “clear from the circumstances where the blame lay”.

The inquest heard how Mr Thomas and his friends had ordered a taxi to bring back 32 cans of beer to the flat before the deaths on September 2.

Mr Thomas told the inquest, in Llangefni, on Anglesey, he had no recollection of how much he had drunk before the fire. “I remember putting the children to bed [about 9pm], but after we started drinking I can’t remember what we did. I don’t know how much I had to drink.”

Mr Pritchard Jones asked, “Do you think it’s possible you could have fallen asleep with a cigarette remaining alight?”

“I could have done, yes,” Mr Thomas answered.

Forensic scientist Stephen Andrews said he believed a “smouldering cigarette being dropped” onto the sofa was the most likely cause of the flat fire at Llanfaethlu, on Anglesey.

He told the inquest the most likely scenario was that after his two friends had left Mr Thomas had woken to find the sofa on fire and had attempted to battle the flames with his T-shirt.

After leaving the flat he spoke to a taxi driver and two women who had parked near the property.

One of the women, Bethan Parry, told him to go and warn his landlord of the blaze.

The other woman, Rhian Richardson, later heard the two boys’ screams and mounted a failed rescue attempt with taxi driver Mark Barker.

Mrs Parry, Mrs Richardson and Mr Barker all told the inquest they believed Mr Thomas had forgotten about Konnor and Kyal.

It was only when Mr Thomas returned moments later and he was told of the boys’ presence in the flat that he realised his mistake, they said. The inquest heard he fought his way back up to the children’s bedroom, but the youngsters had left this room and headed for the lounge, probably in search of their father, where the fire was at its most intense.

Mr Andrews said had they remained in their room they probably would have survived long enough to be rescued by firefighters.

Mr Thomas smashed a window in the room to enable him to breathe before spending up to five minutes searching for the boys. After realising they were not in the room he leapt from a first floor window.

The fire investigation that followed the blaze recovered two smoke alarms from under the kitchen sink that were not being used when the blaze took hold. The flat also had two fire safety doors between the lounge and the boys’ bedroom, which the inquest heard may have been left open. One of the doors had a self-closing device that had never been fitted.

Mr Pritchard Jones said, if used properly, both the smoke alarms and the fire safety doors might have saved the boys’ lives.

Home office pathologist Dr Brian Rodgers said the boys died as a result of carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide poisoning – fumes created by the fire.

Teen escapes burning home- but no water available to fight fire!

The smoke detectors and exit plan worked.....but what happened to the water?

A 17-year-old boy jumped out a window and called 911 early this morning after a fire engulfed his home on Kent's East Hill.

Around 3 a.m., the teen was awakened by the sound of smoke detectors going off and got out of the house in the 11400 block of Southeast 281st Street, according to Kent fire officials. When firefighters arrived on the scene at 3:10 a.m., they found the house fully engulfed in flames.

Because there aren't any fire hydrants in the neighborhood, firefighters had to use a truck to shuttle water to the blaze from a hydrant about a half-mile away, said fire Capt. Kyle Ohashi.

11 Year Old Girl saves family from fire that she played a part in causing

WAVY TV 10 - News, Weather, Traffic, Sports for Hampton Roads, Virginia - North Eastern North Carolina - 11 Year Old Girl saves family from fire that she played a part in causing

11-year-old KeKe Wilson says this to other kids,""Don't, don't mess with fire ever again."
Wilson speaks the truth even when it has cost her so much. Her Suffolk home on Lake Kennedy Drive went up in flames about 4:30 this morning. And the girl admits her actions ignited this accidental fire. Wilson says, "I was like had matches and I had lit the candles. I had two candles. I had lit 'em and that's, that's the cause of the fire."

But her mistake is the kind any grownup could have made and what she did after has more than made up for her slipup. Suffolk firefighters say Wilson told them she did light the candle hanging on a wall that was the source of the flames. Hours later in the motel where she and her grandmother are now living, Wilson further explains she thought she had extinguished the candle flame,"I thought I had blew the candle out I thought I had blewn the candle it, it wasn't, it wasn't out so."

Wilson says she fell asleep and then woke up to a fire burning her bed by her feet, "I just ran, I ran to my grandma's room and I said, I said to my grandmom, I said mom there's a fire, there's a fire, there's a fire in my bed."

Wilson's 60 year old grandmother, Dorothy Mae Cross, says, "So I jumped up ran and looked into her room and saw the fire at the foot of the bed started hollering calling my brother telling him the house is on fire and get up, get up, got to get up and get out."

Now Suffolk firefighters credit the girl for saving herself, her grandmother, and her 30 year old grand-uncle Tyrone Ralph-- who jumped out a window to escape after hearing Wilson's grandmother's warnings.

Suffolk Fire Captain Jim Judkins points out, "This could have been a very tragic story here today."

Cross adds, "I'm very proud of her cause my baby could have been gone. She could have got burned up... I thank God we're here, God woke her up to wake us up."