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It pays to be
attentive in kitchen
Oct. 8-14 is Fire Prevention Week, and the theme chosen by the National
Fire Protection Association is “Prevent Cooking Fires.”
You may wonder, why is someone burning food
on the stove considered such an important issue that it would be used as a
national theme?
It may come as a surprise to some, but firefighters know that a
large number of house fires begin in the kitchen area.
In fact more fires start in the kitchen than any other room in the
house, and two out of three cooking fires start with the stove.
A National Fire Protection Association report for the year 2003
reported 200 deaths, over 5,000 injuries and more than $300 million worth
of damages in fires started by electric and gas stoves. I don’t want to
bore you with facts and figures, but I do want you to realize that the
kitchen can be one of the most dangerous rooms in the house, and
precautions must be taken while cooking.
The leading cause of kitchen fires is unattended cooking. I cannot
begin to tell you the number of times I have responded to a reported fire
and you pull up in front of the house and that familiar smell of burned
food greets you when you step off the truck. More often than not people forget
they have food on the stove and leave the home, or they fall asleep. You
should always watch what you heat. If you have to leave the cooking area,
even if only for a short period of time, I would recommend that you turn
the stove off.
If you have a grease fire while cooking, pleas! e
don’t use water to try and extinguish the fire. It will only create more
problems by spreading the fire and possibly burning you.
After you turn off the burner, it is best to put on an oven mitt and
carefully slide a lid over the pan, which will smother the fl a m es.
It’s also important that we protect our kids. When children are
present while cooking, we should enforce a kid-free zone of three feet
around the stove and only use the back burners when possible. A little
prevention could save your child from the devastating effects of a burn.
The most important thing to remember is not to put your family in a
dangerous situation. If you cannot control the problem quickly, you should
evacuate everyone in the house and call the fire department.
24/7/365: You call; we res p o n d .
KENNETH LEE KNIGHT is a battalion chief in the High Point Fire
Department. He can be contacted at kenneth.knight@highpointnc.gov.
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