Surge in house fire deaths may be tied to cost of living
Photo:
123RF
Fire and Emergency (FENZ) says the cost of living could be to blame for the highest number of house fire fatalities in a decade.
According to FENZ, in the past 12 months 17 people have died in avoidable house fires. In a typical year there were about 13 fatalities.
FENZ reduction and investigations manager Pete Gallagher said in some cases, fires had been sparked by people using barbecues to heat their homes.
"One of the things we're concerned about is people using non-traditional heating devices as a way of heating their homes," he told RNZ's
Midday Report
.
"In order to reduce the cost of living and reduce their use of electricity, they're resorting to using items we wouldn't normally see in a household setting, things like barbecues being brought inside and used as a heating device in the home."
He estimated roughly four or five fatal house fires in the past year were caused by people taking desperate measures to keep themselves warm.
"We still see people utilising industrial heaters in a domestic home, and obviously they're a very powerful heater designed to heat large warehouses, and we saw some tragedy result in the use of one of those last year."
Gallagher said people needed to think about safety when heating their homes.
He said there were two incidents in the past year where candles caused a fire, which resulted in death.
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