Lancashire Fire & Rescue Service (LFRS) is asking Lancashire to “Stay there and cook it” to prevent cooking fires this Christmas.
Whether it’s a visitor at the door, a phone call or the kid’s new toys, simple distractions can have devastating effects when cooking. Around half of all accidental house fires that fire and rescue services attend each year are cooking related fires. Research carried out by Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service shows most cooking fires were caused by the person becoming distracted by something in the home, with 119 cooking fires caused by distractions in 2020 and half of these occurring in December! This is why LFRS is campaigning to raise awareness of the dangers of cooking fires, with the message “Stay there and cook it!”
A major cause of accidental house fires is the risk of distraction; in 2020 people becoming distracted in the kitchen was the cause of 36% of cooking related fires. You can help reduce accidental cooking fires in the home, by keeping to the task at hand. It’s so easy to become distracted, so stay in the room and pay attention.
From January to December 2020, Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service were called to 386 cooking related accidental house fires; encouragingly however we have seen a 3% decrease in cooking incidents compared to 2019. We hope that if people follow the “Stay there and cook it!” message and remember distractions could be disastrous, this figure will reduce again for 2021.
Group Manager Kirsty McCreesh, the Prevention lead for Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service explains more; “Our data shows that cooking fires can happen to anyone, they are the most common type of fires in people’s homes that we attend, and we want to see the number significantly reduced and an end to injuries. We always see a rise in cooking related incidents in the festive season and there are plenty of simple things that people can do to drastically reduce the chance that they will experience one and these include staying with cooking, not getting distracted and keeping the hob and surrounding area clean and clear. Make sure that you have working smoke alarms and, should a fire occur, get out, stay out and call us out.”
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