- Author
- Hall, J. R., Jr.
- Title
- Home Cooking Fire Patterns and Trends.
- Coporate
- National Fire Protection Association, Quincy, MA
- Keywords
- home fires | fire statistics | fire risk | methodology | residential buildings | death | stoves | costs
- Identifiers
- home cooking structure fire problem, by year; U.S. home cooking structure fires: by type of equipment; U.S. home cooking structure fire civilian deaths: by type of equipment; U.S. home cooking structure fire civilian injuries: by type of equipment; U.S. home cooking structure fire direct property damage (in millions of dollars) by type of equipment; U.S. home structure fires involving cooking and/or kitchen: by year; trends in U.S. use of cooking power sources; comparative risks of gas versus electric stoves; U.S. non-fire carbon monoxide deaths involving home cooking equipment; profile of home cooking devices; gas range or stove; electric range or stove; as ovens or rotisserie; electric oven or rotisserie; protable cooking or warming device; deep fryer; as grill; charcoal grill; fixed food warming appliance; grease hood or duct; microwave oven; how national estimates statistics are calculated
- Abstract
- In 2001, cooking equipment was involved in 117,100 reported home structure fires, the largest share for any major cause. Of these fires, 48,900 were reported as fires confined to a cooking vessel (meaning the interior of a cooking device or appliance), with no other details on the type of cooking equipment involved. The "confined fire" option is a new feature of NFIRS Version 5.0, which was first used in 1999. The apparent increase in home cooking fires in recent years is entirely due to confined fires, many or most of which would probably have been coded as something other than fire prior to 1999. All analysis of detailed patterns of home cooking fires must be based on the 68,200 non-confined fires for which details were solicited, if not always provided. In addition to the 117,100 home structure fires involving cooking equipment, there were an estimated 3,800 reported outdoor home grill fires in 2001. In 2001, cooking equipment structure fires in homes resulted in 370 civilian deaths, 4,290 civilian injuries, and $453 million in direct property damage. Cooking also ranks first in number of civilian fire injuries. All measures of loss for home cooking fires have declined since 1980, but in recent years these losses have varied up and down with no clear, consistent trend. This contrasts with the clear downward trend in total home fires and associated losses. Most home cooking fires (68% of the unconfined home cooking fires in 2001 and probably many or most of the confined fires as well) involve the range, and more specifically the stovetop portion, and this is also true for losses in home cooking fires.