- Author
- Hall, J. R., Jr.
- Title
- Home Heating Fire Patterns and Trends.
- Coporate
- National Fire Protection Association, Quincy, MA
- Keywords
- heating | heaters | space heaters | water heaters | furnaces | stoves | heat tape | fireplaces | fire statistics | injuries | chimneys | death | damage | ignition | carbon monoxide | human factors engineering | fire safety | safety
- Identifiers
- chimney connectors; central heating units; how national estimates statistics are calculated; safe heating behaviors; U.S. demand for heating, measured in heating degree days, 1980-2005; home heating fires by time of day; home fires involving portable or stationary sprce heaters by year; home fires involving civilian deaths by year; ome fires involving fireplaces by year; home fires involving chinmeys or chimney connectors by year; home fires involving fireplaces, boilers or other central heating units by year; home fires involving water heaters by year
- Abstract
- In 2003, heating equipment was involved in an estimated 53,200 reported U.S. home structure fires, with associated losses of 260 civilian deaths, 1,260 civilian injuries, and $494 million in direct property damage. These totals represent large decreases from the peaks reached in the early to mid-1980s. Most home heating fire deaths (73% in 2003) specifically involve fixed (stationary) or portable space heaters. Chimneys and chimney connects accounted for the largest share of home heating fire incidents (40%), nearly all of them reported as fires confined to a chimney or flue. Any type of space heater poses a much higher risk of fire, death, injury, and loss per million users than does any type of central heating. Comparisons of risk among different types of space heaters or different types of central heating is not straightforward in part because of issues such as (a) whether to include chimney and chimney connector fires with the wood-burning devices they support, (b) whether to include deaths due to unvented carbon monoxide but not fire with the fuel-burning (principally gas-burning) devices they support, and (c) whether to include heat pumps in usage figures for electric-powered heating equipment.