Editorial 13.1, January 2011. by Deirdre Helfferich Fire on the Lump I have been suspicious of our microwave oven for quite some time. We obtained this little white box from the Psychology Department at UAF many years ago, when their then-department secretary decided to clean up the office and organize it in preparation for her departure and the arrival of a couple of graduate students. (This was some time in the mid 1990s, when I was working for the UA Press and it and the Psych Dept. were in the basement of the Gruening Building.) So for $30, I became the owner of a cute little microwave, which has labored faithfully over the years for us, warming up tea or soup or coffee or popping corn. We never actually cooked in it, but as the years went by, the platter refused to rotate anymore, and we kept having to find the sweet hot spot, turning the bowl or plate every minute or so to get our food more or less evenly hot. I decided that such an old and cranky microwave probably wasn’t safe to stand next to, so I would turn it on and promptly go elsewhere so as to avoid cooking myself. It was old, but it worked, more or less, so we never got around to replacing it. Then Trey and Greta’s place burnt up. On a Saturday afternoon in early January, my friend Trey stepped out to run some errands. Greta was camping in Hawaii. Their dogs, Brutus and Paco, stayed at the house on Stone Road. The fire caught shortly after Trey left the house, and 45 minutes later, when he came home, their kitchen and living room were solidly scorched, their electrical system was fried, and Paco, a friendly and engaging spaniel mix whom it has been my delight to know, was dead. It was fairly obvious what had caused the fire. The microwave—which was plugged in, but not on—had evidently and spontaneously (or perhaps in reaction to a power surge) arced, caught the wall on fire, and melted plastics throughout the kitchen in a hot flash fire that extended in a wide V from the microwave. Things in the path of that blast of heat were destroyed, burnt up, melted, or coated with a layer of toxic soot. One item, a crock pot we’d given Trey and Greta for Christmas, had been situated such that the plastic handle on one side had melted, but the handle on the other side was fine. All the windows upstairs were cracked. The roof of their home may need to be replaced. On the other side of the living room, their many books and artworks were coated with a layer of grime. Some may be cleanable, some will have to be thrown away. The fire department—in particular, Mark Simpson, who lives nearby—were there promptly after Trey called, and were able to put out the fire with a minimum of additional damage. The only reason the house hadn’t burned to the ground was because the fire was so hot and fast it used up the oxygen in the room, and so was only smoldering when Trey came home. Brutus, miraculously, survived the fire. Trey later told us that the insurance adjustor who came to visit confirmed that old microwave ovens were often a suspected cause of house fires. I ran into Cameron Wohlford, the Ester Volunteer Fire Department chief, and he said that he’d seen it a few times in house fires, and recommended that people replace their microwaves after a few years. From what I was able to discover, some brands (Emerson, GE, Whirlpool, KitchenAid, Frigidaire) have had problems and particular models were subject to recalls when they do peculiar things like turn themselves on, explode, or catch fire. I wasn’t able to find much on the web about house fires cause by microwaves, but decided that didn’t matter. We went home and promptly threw out our ancient nuker. It’s required some adjustment, but now we have to reheat our tea or soup on the stove. There’s a little more counter space, and no more annoying rattling, humming, or ping! noises coming from the kitchen (just the horrible morning wake-up music on KSUA). It’s not as convenient, but I feel safer. We may eventually get a new microwave. In the meantime, Hans has been helping Greta and Trey with the inventory and cleanup of their house, and I’m keeping a sharp eye on the Emerson microwave in my office. | ||
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