I am a little worried by people talking about fire extinguishers because the fact is if you own them you are likely to use them instead of getting out of the building. Many people with extinguishers tackle fires that are just too big for the extinguisher to handle and the evidence shows that many more people that stay to fight the fire die than those that just attempt to evacuate.
A fire in the home in most cases is totally unmanageable within 60 seconds. It is not the fire that kills but the smoke and fumes. If you stick around to fight the fire you are breathing in that stuff which is slowly rendering you useless. If you use an extinguisher you are actually increasing the amount of dangerous un-burnt fumes given off by the fire.
A fire extinguisher is great to have for knocking down small fires that have just started but once they are bigger than a waste paper bin fire then it is time to get out.
Couldn't agree more. That's the same general "rule" I was taught. (I've been trained on various types of extinguishers all the way to a 1 1/2" hose for handling petrol fires) That size of fire (wastepaper basket) should be able to be put out with a simple 2 lb. fire extinguisher. Having a larger one is OK but having that larger extinguisher might also give someone more confidence that they could put out a larger fire than they really should be trying to handle. An unnoticed smoldering fire in a couch can go to flashover in 5 minutes but the smoke generated can make it very difficult to be in the same room in under a minute.
It is more important to have them close and handy to quickly attack the fire rather than running out to the garage for the big 20 lber and waste 30 seconds. I'd rather have a number of 2-5 lb extinguishers scattered throughout the house.
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