Cooking Fires

Many accidents happen in homes across the world. One of the most preventable ones is fires that occur in the kitchen during cooking. Cooking safety in the kitchen is preventable due to the fact we are aware of many ways to avoid these fires. There are many reasons to learn about safety in the kitchen. Part of these reasons is that with knowledge and steps of prevention, you can reduce the amount of property damage, loss of life, and insurance costs.

“In 2009, 2,565 people died in home fires. Nearly all of these deaths could have been prevented by taking a few simple precautions like having working smoke alarms and a home fire escape plan, keeping things that can burn away from the stove and always turning off space heaters before going to bed,’ says Jason Cullen of the Eliot Fire Department.” (Eliot Fire Department). Uncountable numbers of meals are cooked everyday in this country without incident; however, the meals that end in a house fire is our focus today. As young children in grammar school, either in science or by a firefighter during fire prevention week was taught about the fire triangle. Three components must be present to have fire; oxygen, heat, and a fuel. Oxygen is in our atmosphere and is ever present. While cooking the stove is the heat source and the cooking oils used and fats from meat are the fuels. The triangle has to be broken to extinguish a fire. Remove one of the components and the fire will go out.

The five different classes of fires are A, B, C, D, and K. Class A is ordinary combustibles, which include trash, paper, wood. Class A fires can be extinguished by water. Water cools the fuel and reduces the heat, hence break the triangle. Water is readily available and cheap and a very common exting...

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...igilant and staying in the kitchen while cooking is the number one safety tip. Turn off the stove and move the pot before leaving the kitchen to do something else. Have working smoke alarms in the house is vital. Keep fire extinguishers in the home and check regularly. The stove hood extinguisher is a good back up in case things go wrong. All of these steps can help in protecting the most precious items in your house. These items are your family members.

Works Cited

"Essentials of Firefighting 4th Edition." Association, International Fire Service Training. n.d. 133.

Eliot Fire Department. FPNewsletter2011. 4 November 2011 .

Live Safe. 3 November 2011 .

Training, IFSTA - International Fire Service. "Essentials of Fire Fighting and Fire Department Operations." n.d. 115-121.