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Monday, April 16, 2012
Where there's smoke, there's fire
Another significant structure fire last week was the result of careless disposal of smoking materials. This makes about five of these in the past couple of weeks. Discarded cigarettes are a leading cause of fatal residential fires in the United States. Batallion Chief Jeannie Pashalek and Chief Inspector Bill Moody did a nice job after one of this month's fires briefing the media on the dangers of cigarette butts. A week later, though, the same act: tossing a butt in a plastic trash can, destroyed a duplex in pretty dramatic fashion. There is a rather obvious relationship between these two graphs:
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9 comments:
These are still my favorite graphs.
Can these careless smokers be prosectuted when they are the cause of these fires?
Steve,
See the applicable Municipal Code, 9.40.070, Negligent Smoking.
I have twice had pitched cigarette butts, still lit, land in my lap as I've been driving in my Miata convertible. Both times the cigs were tossed by drivers of pickup trucks. Both times, I was able to get the thing out of my car before I was burnt. And both times, I yelled a choice f-bomb at the driver. And both times, I received the one-finger salute. Why people think that others wish to deal with their stinking cigarette detritus is beyond me. And yeah, I tossed them out of my car, but only because I don't have a container to put them in....but I don't smoke, either.
I think there may be a failure with the anti-fire features of cigarettes(enacted by law recently), I have noticed that mine want to continue burning when I put them out in the ashtray maybe we need to check in on the manufacture of the smokes and make sure they don't have a defect in their process there does seem to be a trend
For Lincoln single-family, owner-occupied residence fires caused by careless disposal of a cigarette, what is the average assessed value of the property involved?
I see it would be against the law to start a fire via careless (reckless) smoking, but I don't know what the penalty would be. My concern is, would they be liable for the resulting property damage, injuries, or loss of life? I'm guessing the answer might be yes, but collecting might be a whole other story.
Too bad they don't do it like we had to do in boot camp: for every six people smoking, there had to be a bucket full of water in the room, and all butts had to be placed into the water when the smoker had finished with them. There was ample water to douse a fire that might have sprung up in the meantime.
Director Casady,
Can you generate a map of the cigarette-caused residence fires in Lincoln over the last 12 months, without too much trouble? Also, residential fires caused by improperly-installed/maintained wood stoves, space heaters, and not-to-code wiring if you could. If it's too much work, I understand.
OMG! They better raise the tax on tobacco products. That'll teach those darned fire-bug smokers!
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