There’s no other place safer than home. It is your personal crib where you find most ease and convenience. Your shelter and sanctuary, it is where you can feel most secure and hushed. Literally, your own dwelling is your comfort zone. Familiarity to the place you inhabit makes you truly realize and feel that it’s where you belong.
Nevertheless, even when you are just at home, it is also possible to encounter difficulties and to be involved in mishaps. Without leaving the borders of your residence, there could also be dangers that could bother and attack you. Particularly if or when you are not careful and not prepared, and your house is not designed for safety and functionality, those harms can get near you and your life.
The kitchen is one of the most fun areas inside the house. It is where the magic of crafting tasty feasts for loved ones happens. It is where you can enjoy preparing and making food that makes the tummy happy and the heart merry. Even though it could be considered the kindest area, it is also the riskiest room inside the house. Because it is where fuel tanks, electronic devices, appliances and flammable substances are found and used, the kitchen could present the home’s most terrible perils.
Protect your property, your family and yourself. Here are x ways to prevent cooking fire accidents at home.
1 – Remove flammable objects around the stove.
Before you start cooking, organize the kitchen. To be specific your worktop should be clean and clear before you begin your task. Scan the surrounding areas and objects. Remove all the flammable objects around the stove. Put away any item whose material can conduct heat or catch fire.
Things that you must keep afar include towels, oven mitts, pot holders, cookbooks and newspapers, cartons, table mats, wooden stuff and many more! If they accidentally come close to fire from the stove, they might burn and cause bigger danger.
2 – Stay in the kitchen and focus when cooking something.
Do not be very complacent even when you are an excellent cook. Even when you only turn the stove on low or medium heat or just set the microwave oven on for a minute, you have to be attentive to your kitchen work.
Stay in the kitchen when any appliance is activated. Avoid leaving the room for long minutes, especially if you are going outside or upstairs. Focus when cooking something. Brush off distractions such as using your cell phone, watching television or chatting with people. Keep your eyes on what you are cooking or baking. Do not leave working fire and any running electronic kitchen equipment unattended.
If you cannot help but multitask, make sure you do not ever forget that you are cooking something, and do not entertain any other task that is outside the kitchen. You should still be in the kitchen while doing other extra duties.
3 – Make sure you are awake while cooking.
Some people have the tendency to fall asleep while cooking, especially very early in the morning. It’s dangerous because you will not be able to become aware of what’s happening to the food you are cooking. It might get burned and start a fire.
Make sure you are wide awake while cooking. Wash your face. Remain standing up. Open the lights. Play some music. Do what it takes to fight the sleepiness that attacks you while you are trying to cook.
4 – Use a cooking timer
Some cooking fire accidents happen when homeowners fail to turn off the stove or any opened kitchen machine. It’s either they overestimate the time needed to let the food boil or get fried, or they honestly forget about the time.
Timing is crucial in the kitchen. You always have to be alert. Use a cooking timer to be informed whenever you need to flip, mix or stop cooking whatever you are cooking. See to it that you hit the ‘set timer’ button before you relax and wait for it to go off later. Doing so lets you expectantly stand by and avoid leaving elsewhere.
5 – Avoid long and hanging sleeves when cooking.
The right outfit is also a must when cooking. You should be properly dressed, not stylishly but safely, for you, your food and your home.
Besides wearing an apron, gloves if you prefer and hairnet, you should also take note of avoiding long and hanging sleeves when cooking. As much as possible, wear clothes with sleeves that do not have the possibility to touch the pan or the food itself. That is to prevent the cloth of your top from touching off. Short-sleeved clothing will do.
6 – Unplug kitchen appliances not in use
Whenever kitchen appliances are not in use, unplug them carefully, and store the wires securely. Even when such devices are turned off, if they are plugged in, they are partly turned on still. They might cause fire when something goes wrong with the socket, or electrocution might happen when they suddenly get touched by wet hands or conductors.
7 – Turn off the gas stove and tank after cooking
After using the kitchen for cooking, never miss turning off the gas stove and tank. Before stepping out of the cooking area, ensure that the tank is tightly sealed. Gas leaks are hazardous. They are the most horrible sources of explosions and cooking fire accidents.
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FIRE OUT
Cooking fire is one of the most common accidents among residential areas. Often, the reason is human error or negligence. In some instances, it can also occur because of machine malfunction. Whatever the cause is, what you can be sure of is that the effects are definitely damaging and deleterious. Not only houses are ruined and depleted but also lives.
SAFETY IN
Keep your home away from the tendencies of cooking fire accidents. Ensure that your house is designed and established smartly to stand well in the face of catastrophes, both natural and man-made. Work with excellent home builders, residential and commercial roofing contractors, risk management system installers and other experts when it comes to home safety. Hope not, but in case of emergencies, like fire, you know what to do and how to do it to save your lives and your house.
It is also important that not just you but everyone living in your house is aware of the possible threats in the kitchen, so everybody can be mindful of how to move in it and how to use it and everything in it. Being cautious and observant can help you detect early signs of cooking fire tendencies. Alertness and quickness are needed for you to see ahead, think ahead and move ahead of greater jeopardy.
The power of fire cannot be always measured, but you can always do something to avoid needing to come face to face against it.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nicole Ann Pore is a writer, an events host and a voice over artist. Quality and well-researched writing is her worthwhile avenue to enlighten and delight others about things that matter. She is a daytime writer for Young & Co Roofing Manchester, an excellent roofing and cladding company in Greater Manchester. Nicole graduated Cum Laude from De La Salle University Manila, Philippines with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication Arts.
