With Thanksgiving around the corner, officials are reminding people to take extra precautions when cooking on what is historically the busiest day of the year for fire departments across Massachusetts.
In the last five years, there have been just over 700 Thanksgiving Day fires across the state, according to the state fire marshal. Of those fires, 86 percent have been caused by cooking activities. Last year alone, firefighters across the state responded to 123 fires on Thanksgiving, resulting in several injuries and $1.4 million in damage.
“There are more house fires on Thanksgiving Day than any other day of the year,” Peter J. Ostroskey, the state fire marshal, said in a statement. “Practice fire safety this holiday to prevent any unexpected guests (like firefighters) from ruining your festivities.”
Making sure your house has working smoke and carbon monoxide alarms is the first step, Ostroskey said. But there are several other safety precautions people should follow as they fire up the oven:
- Make sure your oven is empty before turning it on
- Wear short or tight-fitting sleeves when cooking
- Turn pot handles inward over the stove
- Stay in the kitchen when boiling, frying, or broiling
- Use a timer when baking or roasting, and never leave the house with the oven running
In the event of a stovetop fire, people should put a lid on the pan and immediately turn off the heat, fire officials said. For oven or broiler fires, keeping the oven doors shut and turning off the heat is the safest bet.
If the fire does not quickly diminish, people should leave the house and call 911 from outside.
The use of outdoor gas-fueled turkey fryers that immerse the bird in hot oil are discouraged by the National Fire Protection Association, fire officials said. No such fryers have been listed as safe by safety certification laboratories.
The home use of “turkey fryers that use cooking oil, as currently designed, are not suitable for safe use by even a well-informed and careful consumer,” the NFPA said in a statement. “Oil-less” turkey fryers are recommended, since an oil spill and the ignition of spilled oil “is quite high.”
With colder temperatures arriving, fire officials reminded residents to have their chimneys cleaned and inspected, and give the furnace an annual check-up. Behind cooking, home heating issues are the second leading cause of fires on Thanksgiving.
Matt Berg can be reached at matthew.berg@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @mattberg33.
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