Citation

Nemire K. Proc. Hum. Factors Ergon. Soc. Annu. Meet. 2014; 58(1): 1869-1873.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1541931214581391

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

A case study is presented of a fatal incident in which a man poured denatured alcohol on the wick of an alcohol stove with the intention of later lighting the wick, failed to first notice the wick had already been lit, and was engulfed in flames after the wick's flame followed the stream of fuel into the can, and caused an explosion that spewed flaming fuel onto his torso. A survey was conducted to examine common knowledge about the invisible flame of burning denatured alcohol, and showed that none of the participants were aware that denatured alcohol burned with an invisible flame before the survey, and that a small percentage recognized it as a hazard after reading the product label. The incident is evaluated from the perspective of the manufacturer's failure to guard users from the hazard of the invisible flame and their failure to warn users of the hazard.

Language: en