Christmas Eve Fryer Fire

Alright, it's been a couple of years since I posted this, and I've read some of the comments, so I think it's time to post some counterpoints to the most common statements.

Some of you have mentioned putting the fire out with the lid. That was the first thing we did (before the video). The lid warped immediately and did nothing to smother the fire. You can see the guy holding the lid with tongs because it was still too hot to touch with bare hands from covering the fire moments before.

Others have mentioned baking soda as the solution. We tried that, as you can see at the beginning of the video. As it turns out, baking soda is flammable at that high of a temperature. We would have needed a tremendous amount of it to put this fire out, and all we had was the one large box.

Call the fire department? Turn your sound on and you'll hear the phone call. The video ends when I went to move my car so the fire department could get in.

Don't put water on a grease fire: It's important to note WHY you've been told this since childhood. Water boils at a much lower temperature than oil burns, so it will splash oil everywhere when used on a grease fire. Since that oil is already on fire, it will spread the fire to whatever it lands on. As you can see in the video, my friend's dad very methodically wet the deck to reduce the chance of the fire spreading before wetting a rug and using it to smother the flame. He then kept the rug wet to prevent it catching. You can tell from the tremendous amount of steam that this was absolutely necessary, as the part of the rug covering the fire would have likely dried enough to catch in less than a minute without wetting. Water was also used to cool the pot and prevent re-ignition. After the video ended and the fire department came, we sprayed the fryer with water for another half-hour or so, tracking the temperature with an infrared thermometer until it was below 200º F.

Frying on a wood deck: Yeah, that was stupid. We were lucky we caught it in time to contain it and no one got hurt. Smart people do dumb things sometimes. What's done is done, and now you have this video so you can learn what not to do.

Should move the gas canister farther away: Do you know what it takes to blow one of those things up? A lot more than that little fire. They're actually designed to be a minimal hazard in the event of a fire, so it's really not a concern. The can was also empty at this point, but I moved it to the edge of the deck anyway.

When the fire department arrived, all that was left for them to do was check under the deck to make sure the fire hadn't spread elsewhere. By the end of this video, we had it pretty well under control.

Thanks for watching. Be careful with fire.

Watch me fix things at http://rebuilddontreplace.com

Category:

Education

Tags:

• turkey
• fryer
• fire
• grease
• oil
• extinguish
• inferno

[prohelipilot1]

Pizza for dinner tonight

[NeuroticPastry]

HERP DERP, IM AMERICAN, I LEIK FRYER'S HEEEEEEEEEERP-A-DEEEEEEERP

[counciousstream]

@turbulus Me too and a damn good one at that. I'm also the most humble human on the planet.

[counciousstream]

@dollabilyall: The pots are all aluminum and contrary to what people commenting on this video think, the oil fire doesn't get hot enough to melt the pot. The smartest thing to do is move the whole thing to a spot far away from anything that you don't want to catch fire, have a fire extinguisher on hand and make sure the damn turkey is thawed all the way and excess water drained off of it.

[dollabilyall]

@counciousstream I'm sure the pot is stainless steel and oil will not burn hot enough to melt it and although it worked out for them this time the smartest thing you can do is make sure to have a fire extinguisher ready at all times. Thankful for this family that it worked out well but for many it doesn't and should be a reminder to everyone too invest in a fire extinguisher or three ;)

[white12rhino]

how about a fire extinguisher?

[counciousstream]

putting water on the carpet to both limit the oxygen and reduce the ignition source (heat) will eventually put the fire out. If done carefully and before the aluminum pot melts and spills the oil, all that will happen will be a great story to tell.

[bacondude1217]

I guess they had pizza...

[marshalljimduncan]

This was a bad idea, lol!!

[codydcarlson]

Good save man!

[robertg222]

But what happened to the turkey. Was it saved?

[PassMeMySpitCup]

@bacondude1217 At least turn it off...