Residents Urged Not to Handle Fire, etc.
FairCityNews.com | Jul 23, 2009 | Comments 0
Strafford, MO—Health officials are warning people not to handle fire, broken glass, hazardous material, dirty needles, poison or unknown chemicals after “pretty dancing lights” burned two Strafford area residents when they tried to grasp the illumination, otherwise known as “flames from a fire” last week. The Springfield-Greene County Health Department would like to remind area residents not to handle dangerous combustible items.
The two victims have been advised to receive anti-burn treatment needed to prevent scarring, Springfield-Greene County Health Department assistant director Clay Goddard said.
People who find fire on the ground during daylight or evening in particular should leave it alone, Goddard said.
“If it’s on the ground, it might not be raging, but it is hot,” he said.
While the two people currently show no signs of fever, laboratory tests confirmed the fire they handled was hot, he said.
“It was soo purdy, just glistening like an angel, well we just had to try to pick it up and take it with us. But when we tried, it bit us like a snake! Then I cried,” said one of the victims.
Burns are caused by extreme heat from a fire made via a chemical reaction between oxygen in the atmosphere and some sort of fuel (wood or gasoline) that has been heated to its ignition temperature coming into contact with skin.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that tens of thousands of people are successfully treated each year after being burned by a flame that may be hot, and it adds that a few people die every year because they don’t seek treatment. Burns are 100% preventable, especially if you restrain from picking it up and taking it with you.
Filed Under: Health