How safe is your home from a fire? We recently came across a report that looked at the most common sources of accidental house fires. Could these be a risk in you home? What do you have in place to tackle a fire in your home? If you want help with fire systems to better protect your home, call our team now.
Below we look at the most common sources of accidental house fires in 2021 and 2022. By being aware of these, you can better protect your home from an accidental house fire.
- Other Sources
Within the ‘other sources’ category, a wide range of accidental fire sources are included. Things like electrical sparks, naked flames and hot surfaces for example. The largest category for accidental house fires was ‘other sources’, accounting for 27.9% of all accidental dwelling fires. This is an increase of 3.29% on last year.
- Cooking Appliances
Between the years of 2020-2021 cooking appliances were the biggest source category for accidental fires in houses. While cooking appliances are no longer the top cause, they are still in the top three causes. The report shows that a total of 26.84% of all accidental fires in the home were caused by cooking appliances. We can see in the report that the misuse of cooking equipment and appliances played a huge part of these accidental dwelling fires. In fact, out of the 12,779 accidental fires caused by cooking appliances between 2021 and 2022, 7,741 of these were due to the mishandling of the cooking appliances.
- Electrical Distribution
13.98% of all accidental home fires between 2021 and 2022 were caused by electrical distribution. This was the third main source of accidental dwelling fires. The report shows us that this was mainly due to faulty fuel supplies. In fact, this was the highest contributing factor or electrical distribution accidental dwelling fires all together. The electrical distribution category also had one of the highest increases compared to the previous year. There have been 6.50% more electrical distribution accidental dwelling fires in 2021 to 2022, than 2020 to 2021.
Due to this increase in accidental dwelling fires, it has now been updated in England that all homes must have a smoke detector on every storey. This has been introduced as an update to the smoke alarm regulations in England. If you need help protecting your domestic property from a fire, call our fire safety specialists.
