Dear All

Just investigated a fire in the past week where the only available ignition source was a table lamp. Being reluctant to blame what should be an innocent household item I asked the homeowner for more details about the lamp.

Apparently the lamp had only been bought in the past couple of weeks from a well known high street store and it is clear from the website that it should be fitted with a standard 60 watt bulb, although the homeowner had fitted an energy efficient bulb (details of exact type not available but believe it was approximately 5 amp with advertised equivalence of a 60 watt bulb).

Not sure what effect this would have and any advice or previous experience would be useful. The room of origin had been unattended for approximately 30 minutes, prior to a fully established fire being discovered.

Initials thoughts are a faulty lamp (it came with a factory fitted 10 amp fuse that had blown) although it may be worth noting that a cat was in the room of origin and I can't discount the cat knocking over the lamp as a cause of the fire. However, I am not sure that an energy efficient lightbulb would generate sufficient heat to initiate such a serious fire in the time available (I would expect a smouldering fire to have activated the nearby smoke detectors before the fire became fully developed). The property was fitted with single point ionisation detectors, that alerted the homeowner (who was awake in another part of the property), but only after the fire had already fully established.

I have considered deliberate ignition and smokers materials but there were no smokers at the property and there was nothing suspicious about the circumstances or the people involved, other than a fire starting from what should be a relatively benign source.

Any views, opinions or experience of fires involving energy efficient light bulbs would be much appreciated.

Strip lighting fires

I have recently investigated a fire where one of a number of contenders for the cause was a strip light fitting. It was a twin-bulb self contained unit suspended by 2 wire anchors 2 metres below the structural ceiling in industrial premises. the top housing was of fire resistant glass fibre re-inforced plastic. The diffuser was easily flammable with the formation of burning drops. All component parts (capacitor, ballast etc.) were mounted on the upper surface of the central steel tray. The bulbs were slung beneath the tray. The whole unit forms a well sealed compartment with no dust, fluff or animal litter inside.
We all know that strip lighting can be a cause of fire but in a self-contained, hung unit like this I cannot find any feasible means whereby a minor component overheat or fire on top of the steel tray can transfer fire to the flammable diffuser. The fire service investigator (overseas) was of the opinion that if one component part was burning the heat contained within the housing could transfer fire to other component parts. He had recently attributed a fire to this very cause and scenario. I ran a number of tests on control samples at site and will write them up for the IFE site in due course.
Any views or opinions?

The Gray who?

Just in case anyone is wondering who this Gray Monk fellow is, it's Pat Cox, and the reason I come up as The Gray Monk is that is my Blogger name. Sorry about that folks, but I don't particularly want to have to open a new Blogger account and this way, when I open one, I get both.

For the record I'm currently in Iran teaching FI to the Tehran Fire Service guys and its been interesting, challenging in some respects, and very, very rewarding. If it is deemed appropriate I can post a few pictures and a short report on this activity here for a wider audience.