Q&A: Montgomery Co. Fire official gives safety tips for the holiday season

We’re seeing fires that are related to heating systems, whether it be a wood stove, fire pit or space heaters. In Montgomery County, we’ve already had a few significant fires that have been caused by space heaters catching some nearby combustibles on fire.

Also, people have been getting trees, they bring the trees into the house, so that just adds an extra fire load. We don’t see too many fires caused by Christmas trees, fortunately, in this area. But if they do happen, it’s bad. So, make sure that you keep your tree watered. And even the artificial trees. We did a demo a couple years ago involving an artificial tree. And obviously, they’re hard to catch on fire, but if they do, it’s bad, because it’s all plastic. So, you have to take care of those things. And typically, those fires start by electrical lights overheating or being frayed.

Yeah, in fact, we had a significant fire the other day caused by candles. And, you know, this time of year, we’ve got Kwanzaa, Christmas, Hanukkah, you know, there’s a lot of celebrations that involve candles. We prefer the flameless candles, electric ones. Or now they have candles that smell like candles. They have beautiful scents. They look like real candles, but they’re flameless and battery operated.

And you know that that’s the reality. But, you know, don’t leave stuff cooking on the stove unattended, don’t leave the candle burning in a room unattended, especially if you’re in a bedroom. We tend to fall asleep.  So, any of these things that give off heat or an open flame, you need to give them space, like space heaters. You need to keep any kind of combustibles or anything that burns away from anything that has an open flame, especially candles.

We recommend three feet for your heating equipment. And you know, if you’ve got little kids and pets, have that kid-free zone or safety zone for them. Just be mindful. But open flames, you know, we’re not big fans of that, of course, but they are pretty and they are part of a lot of the celebrations this time of year. But just be mindful. Don’t leave a candle burning unattended.

Typically, people are just driving too fast. And what’s struck me lately is the fact that over the last couple of years, we’ve had a number of incidents that involve rollovers and cars flipping over, a lot of single car crashes, things of that nature. And usually, it’s just speed. And then you add in, like this morning, it was pretty slick out. It’s not like really bad weather, but you know, it’s slick and you have to slow down. And typically, the speed limits that are posted are for excellent dry conditions. When you have a little inclement weather, you have to slow it down a little bit. That’s the one thing that the fire rescue crews in this area probably, I’ll say, hate the most is being out there on 270, or on 495, that way. It’s dangerous.

Yeah. And we’ve done a great job, I think, here in Montgomery County and in the region with car safety seat inspection. We have a lot of good information. I mean, you need a college degree to figure some of these seats out. But it’s very important. Years ago, we’d see car crashes where kids would get injured. Fortunately, our cars are a lot safer now with the air bags and all kinds of safety devices. But you know, car passenger safety, or child passenger safety is a key thing. So, if you’re traveling, make sure that the kids are buckled in properly.