It wasn’t until a month ago that I had any experience with house fires.
I learned how devastating a house fire could be when it was my own home.
The terrible part was that the fire was my fault. I was in the basement and I heard a sputtering coming from the furnace. The igniter that lights the fire that causes the heat, was sputtering small amounts of gas that was creating small puddles around the igniter switch. I thought it would be harmless if I put some water on the igniter so it would catch fire. By the time I brought the water to the furnace, the puddle of gas lit. I was throwing the water at the same time the gas fumes lit and they splashed into small areas. One of those areas was a lot of wood dust and old papers, which quickly caught fire. Our home was old, and so were the timbers, and they were the next to catch fire. All because I wanted to keep the fire from spreading, I had destroyed my own home, and almost lost my life and that of my child. I swore that I would never have another gas furnace in my home. When my home was rebuilt, I told the contractor that I wanted electric heat because of the cause of the fire. With electric heating and air conditioning, I felt much safer. I learned a lot about how oil and water didn’t mix. I was told that if I called the HVAC company, I would have never had a house fire, and I wouldn’t now be building a new home with electric HVAC.