Be Careful Playing With Fire

[Revoltingest]

An acquaintance who works for a contractor friend put some gasoline
on a soon-to-be bonfire over the July 4th. Then he bent down to light it.
Whoosh!
Gasoline is not only a highly flammable liquid, but it evaporates quickly
to form a combustible gas, thru which a flame front quickly moves.
It's explosive. (I blew up a pot belly stove once. Kids are dumb.)

A couple weeks later now, he's due to be released from the burn unit.
He'll move in with a nurse whose house he & the contractor were
working on. Useful to be on friendly terms with the client, eh.
Anyway, he just barely managed to avoid needing skin grafts.
But the pain from scrubbing away dead skin is so bad that he
was anesthetized during the procedure. Yeah, he's a mess.
Around a quarter of his body...face...arms...hands...was burned.
The nurse says that burns will have long term deleterious effects
on joints & muscle strength too. (I didn't know that.)

Be careful out there, folks.

Oh, this is inconvenient for me. It put work on my property behind
schedule. So I texted Cody....who is now "Fire Marshall Cody"
(after In Living Color's Fire Marshall Bill).....
Get well soon.
There's work to do!

 

[Nakosis]

An acquaintance who works for a contractor friend put some gasoline
on a soon-to-be bonfire over the July 4th. Then he bent down to light it.
Whoosh!
Gasoline is not only a highly flammable liquid, but it evaporates quickly
to form a combustible gas, thru which a flame front quickly moves.
It's explosive. (I blew up a pot belly stove once. Kids are dumb.)

A couple weeks later now, he's due to be released from the burn unit.
He'll move in with a nurse whose house he & the contractor were
working on. Useful to be on friendly terms with the client, eh.
Anyway, he just barely managed to avoid needing skin grafts.
But the pain from scrubbing away dead skin is so bad that he
was anesthetized during the procedure. Yeah, he's a mess.
Around a quarter of his body...face...arms...hands...was burned.
The nurse says that burns will have long term deleterious effects
on joints & muscle strength too. (I didn't know that.)

Be careful out there, folks.

Oh, this is inconvenient for me. It put work on my property behind
schedule. So I texted Cody....who is now "Fire Marshall Cody"
(after In Living Color's Fire Marshall Bill).....
Get well soon.
There's work to do!

There are some stupid mistakes we do in life that we just can't take back.
Hopefully, your life is not filled with too many of them.

 

[exchemist]

An acquaintance who works for a contractor friend put some gasoline
on a soon-to-be bonfire over the July 4th. Then he bent down to light it.
Whoosh!
Gasoline is not only a highly flammable liquid, but it evaporates quickly
to form a combustible gas, thru which a flame front quickly moves.
It's explosive. (I blew up a pot belly stove once. Kids are dumb.)

A couple weeks later now, he's due to be released from the burn unit.
He'll move in with a nurse whose house he & the contractor were
working on. Useful to be on friendly terms with the client, eh.
Anyway, he just barely managed to avoid needing skin grafts.
But the pain from scrubbing away dead skin is so bad that he
was anesthetized during the procedure. Yeah, he's a mess.
Around a quarter of his body...face...arms...hands...was burned.
The nurse says that burns will have long term deleterious effects
on joints & muscle strength too. (I didn't know that.)

Be careful out there, folks.

Oh, this is inconvenient for me. It put work on my property behind
schedule. So I texted Cody....who is now "Fire Marshall Cody"
(after In Living Color's Fire Marshall Bill).....
Get well soon.
There's work to do!

This is a classic mistake. You can get away with putting a bit of kerosene (paraffin) on a bonfire, if you are very careful. But NEVER, ever, gasoline (petrol).

The vapour pressure is far too high and you easily produce a vapour/air mixture within the flammability/explosion limits. Our next-door neighbour had a near miss with petrol on a bonfire when I was a kid. Hospital job for him, too.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

I hope your acquaintance recovers quickly. It's easy to say people justly suffer for their mistakes but I've worked burn units before and I wouldn't wish that kind of pain on anyone.

 

[sun rise]

I thought from the thread title that it was going to be about something else.

But instead, yes, be careful is the message.

Kids are dumb

Since the brain is not mature until age 25, the truth of that statement has scientific evidence to back it up.

 

[Vinayaka]

We (my 3 brothers and I) were really stupid growing up, and lucky to be alive today. The 500 gallon gas tank was readily available for us to take a cup or two for our forts. We'd make fire moats, and the like. Dangerous fun. Once a brother's shirts' came ablaze, and the older brother quickly smothered it with his shirt. Relatively minor burns. But then later the younger brother was playing with it by himself, and was lucky to be close enough to the cattle water tank. He dove in and put it out, but was then taken to the hospital with more severe burns.

Nobody was injured the day another brother was smoking right near the tank, and the whole thing went up in a gigantic mushroom of flame. (It had been filled 2 days earlier) The tank split in two and the remnants were found about 50 yards away from the original spot. Since there was an old wooden cabinet thing sitting by the tank, smoldering bits went all over, and we climbed on the other buildings to put all the cinders out. That brother, to this day, wouldn't admit to any fault.

Yes, it's nasty stuff.

 

[Revoltingest]

Also, don't ever burn brake cleaner or other chlorinated solvents.
The phosgene can kill ya!
Safety Alert! Brake Cleaner = Phosgene Gas

 

[BSM1]

I did a little growing up around the coal mines of southern WV. We had carbide to play with. Carbide was what you burned in the old miner's lamps before battery powered lamps became the norm. Carbide was fun because it had to be wet to burn. You throw a handful in a mud puddle, add lit match, and voila! instant bon fire. Thankfully the most harm I did to myself was singeing my eyebrows off playing with a handful in an empty saltine box (the first couple of matches refuse to light so by the time I got one lit there was a carbide cloud surrounding my head...don't ask).

 

[Stevicus]

I would play with fire, but we never seem to like the same games. Can't play chess, because he'd melt all the pieces and burn the board. Same for Monopoly, Clue, or any other board game. And it wouldn't be very sporting to play water polo with fire.

So, playing with fire is out.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Since the brain is not mature until age 25, the truth of that statement has scientific evidence to back it up.

I'll drop you both in Tanzania along with an average eight year old and we can measure who can speak the language better after 12 months...lol

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I would play with fire, but we never seem to like the same games. Can't play chess, because he'd melt all the pieces and burn the board. Same for Monopoly, Clue, or any other board game. And it wouldn't be very sporting to play water polo with fire.

So, playing with fire is out.

Floor is lava is quite popular with fire...

 

[Mock Turtle]

I did a little growing up around the coal mines of southern WV. We had carbide to play with. Carbide was what you burned in the old miner's lamps before battery powered lamps became the norm. Carbide was fun because it had to be wet to burn. You throw a handful in a mud puddle, add lit match, and voila! instant bon fire. Thankfully the most harm I did to myself was singeing my eyebrows off playing with a handful in an empty saltine box (the first couple of matches refuse to light so by the time I got one lit there was a carbide cloud surrounding my head...don't ask).

When I started caving we used acetylene lamps, and it took some care not to burn ropes whilst climbing ladders, and they often went out whilst descending where water falling was an issue - like descending alongside or in an underground waterfall.

About petrol cans - when I was kid, and in the usual scenario, being on the periphery of a group of older kids out making mischief, a bonfire was started on some waste ground and at one point an almost empty can of petrol was thrown on the fire. Fortunately a warning was given and everyone scarpered rapidly before it inevitably exploded.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Good that you have warned people. People need to be careful when they play with fire. People in India get a few deaths and thousands of burn injuries during Diwali. Explosions occur regularly in factories which prepare fireworks, some are legal, some illegal. Next in frequency is blasts in Cooking Gas cylinders, when even houses blow up (now that many house-holds in use gas cylinders in kitchen. They are given free by the government to reduce forest denudation and improve environment.)

 

[Stevicus]

Floor is lava is quite popular with fire...

There are some drinking games with fire, too.

 

[Thief]

An acquaintance who works for a contractor friend put some gasoline
on a soon-to-be bonfire over the July 4th. Then he bent down to light it.
Whoosh!
Gasoline is not only a highly flammable liquid, but it evaporates quickly
to form a combustible gas, thru which a flame front quickly moves.
It's explosive. (I blew up a pot belly stove once. Kids are dumb.)

A couple weeks later now, he's due to be released from the burn unit.
He'll move in with a nurse whose house he & the contractor were
working on. Useful to be on friendly terms with the client, eh.
Anyway, he just barely managed to avoid needing skin grafts.
But the pain from scrubbing away dead skin is so bad that he
was anesthetized during the procedure. Yeah, he's a mess.
Around a quarter of his body...face...arms...hands...was burned.
The nurse says that burns will have long term deleterious effects
on joints & muscle strength too. (I didn't know that.)

Be careful out there, folks.

Oh, this is inconvenient for me. It put work on my property behind
schedule. So I texted Cody....who is now "Fire Marshall Cody"
(after In Living Color's Fire Marshall Bill).....
Get well soon.
There's work to do!

hornets.....damn hornets

so the little scavengers will eat anything you do
and will get in your face to do that

no fun

I found the nest......a hole in the ground
and i tried first to flood the item......three days

no effect

so........gasoline into the hole...they don't like it......be careful

THEN I tossed matches at the hole
good thing I can do that with some distance

BOOM!

 

[Wu Wei]

An acquaintance who works for a contractor friend put some gasoline
on a soon-to-be bonfire over the July 4th. Then he bent down to light it.
Whoosh!
Gasoline is not only a highly flammable liquid, but it evaporates quickly
to form a combustible gas, thru which a flame front quickly moves.
It's explosive. (I blew up a pot belly stove once. Kids are dumb.)

A couple weeks later now, he's due to be released from the burn unit.
He'll move in with a nurse whose house he & the contractor were
working on. Useful to be on friendly terms with the client, eh.
Anyway, he just barely managed to avoid needing skin grafts.
But the pain from scrubbing away dead skin is so bad that he
was anesthetized during the procedure. Yeah, he's a mess.
Around a quarter of his body...face...arms...hands...was burned.
The nurse says that burns will have long term deleterious effects
on joints & muscle strength too. (I didn't know that.)

Be careful out there, folks.

Oh, this is inconvenient for me. It put work on my property behind
schedule. So I texted Cody....who is now "Fire Marshall Cody"
(after In Living Color's Fire Marshall Bill).....
Get well soon.
There's work to do!

I hope he recovers soon.

I got burned pretty bad (2nd and 3rd degree) but I was not playing with fire, I was working with fire, pipe cutting. Luckily it was only an area on my arm. Looks normal, unless you compare it to the other one, and you see that part of it is missing

 

[Revoltingest]

hornets.....damn hornets

so the little scavengers will eat anything you do
and will get in your face to do that

no fun

I found the nest......a hole in the ground
and i tried first to flood the item......three days

no effect

so........gasoline into the hole...they don't like it......be careful

THEN I tossed matches at the hole
good thing I can do that with some distance

BOOM!

I've built wood fires over their holes.

 

[Wu Wei]

I've built wood fires over their holes.

Shotgun and dynamite.....also good for keeping neighbors away.....nuff said

 

[Revoltingest]

Shotgun and dynamite.....also good for keeping neighbors away.....nuff said

Oddly, I've no problem with neighbors coming over to my compound.

 

[Mock Turtle]

One of the silliest things I ever did occurred once whilst camping. I put a small primus stove in a cardboard box to stop the wind getting at it, and unfortunately some of the meths used to start it off set the box on fire. I managed to remove the stove and then attempted to stamp out the fire. Unfortunately the box refused to let go of my boot and hence I had all my mates laughing at me whilst I hopped about with an increasingly blazing box on my boot until I managed to remove it. Friends are so useful in such situations! Anyway, one of them then almost set his tent on fire, so boohoo!!!