Lucky fire.

Heyseed

Member
My customer had a fire in his rental house. Some guests were staying there and just before heading out to dinner smelled then saw smoke. They called 911, VFD showed up and went in the crawl space to find a fire that was already out. Some critter chewed the wires causing a short. The insulation caught, started burning up the wall and melted the CPVC pipe which sprayed water and doused the fire. But for that lucky chance the whole place would have burned. It was in the back corner and very hard to get to even if the firemen had been right there.
Like I said VERY lucky.
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Wow, that is an amazing sequence of events!

Must have been something else stored there though, insulation is not flammable. The paper cover is, but not enough to have caused that much damage.
 
I'll never figure out how I avoided a fire like that in my shop. Rodents chewed ever bit of insulation on a 6' length of romex wire. Somehow none of the three wires touched each other. I don't know how they did it without getting fried. It was up close to the ceiling so I don't think it was ants.
 
I thought so too Steve, but other than the insulation there was nothing there. Maybe it was full of sawdust and chips from where that cutout was made.
This is all the burnt stuff the FD dragged out. I took a bunch of photos for the insurance company. I had the electrician put the new wires in metal conduit.
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Just another example of why you should feed those critters. Those outdoor bait stations are pretty effective. Stops the rodents before they come in.
 
Right there where it says Shorted Wires, ought to say Code Violation. Bare type NM exposed on top of a water heater, big time Violation. I seem to remember a water heater needs 30 amp circuit breaker protection, and the wire leading to that heater might not be 30 amp wire. Seem to remember it ought to be yellow colored. Can't imagine how anything went wrong there. ....There's something else wrong but I can't exactly place it right now...
 
Hey FBH, there is no water heater in that image. I guess it does look that way, but those two pipes just supply a half bath in the garage turned studio. In this part of the country code does not call for the romex to be in conduit. It should have been stapled to the framing which could have prevented them touching causing the short.
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(quoted from post at 06:51:24 01/10/18) Right there where it says Shorted Wires, ought to say Code Violation. Bare type NM exposed on top of a water heater, big time Violation. I seem to remember a water heater needs 30 amp circuit breaker protection, and the wire leading to that heater might not be 30 amp wire. Seem to remember it ought to be yellow colored. Can't imagine how anything went wrong there. ....There's something else wrong but I can't exactly place it right now...
did not see what those wires were feeding in the post. It did not say water heater as I could see. Even if it had been going to a water heater the wire color may have no bearing depending on the time it was put in. For many years all wire was white. Codes change but existing wiring stays the same.
 
Right there where it says Shorted Wires, ought to say Code Violation. Bare type NM exposed on top of a water heater, big time Violation. I seem to remember a water heater needs 30 amp circuit breaker protection, and the wire leading to that heater might not be 30 amp wire. Seem to remember it ought to be yellow colored. Can't imagine how anything went wrong there. ....There's something else wrong but I can't exactly place it right now...

Where do you see a water heater?
 
It is really a bad practice to have Romex in an area with rodents, that should be in conduit or armored cable.

Rodents are attracted to the wire for some reason.
 

I'm no expert but that whole set up looks sketchy to me... unsecured wire and unsupported pipes and uncovered paper (the backing on the insulation). Hope a lesson is learned and they do it right.
 
(quoted from post at 10:43:17 01/10/18)
I'm no expert but that whole set up looks sketchy to me... unsecured wire and unsupported pipes and uncovered paper (the backing on the insulation). Hope a lesson is learned and they do it right.

I thought this post was about a Lucky Fire and not about wire codes and imaginary water heaters. For that we have electrical professionals.

What's going on. I enjoyed the information and pictures up to the point where I read 'I'm no expert, BUT..'

Stan
 
The lesson to be learned is that melting CPVC should not be counted on to put out fires, rodents love Romex, so it should NEVER be used where they can be present.

It sounds like the owner made a good choice in putting new wiring in conduit.
 
I would say there is no point in your customer buying a lottery ticket today. I think his luck is all used up. Glad it worked out the way it did.

I found a couple small spots where mice had chewed through romex insulation when we remodeled our house. Kind of scary thinking what could have happened.
 
My cousin survived a similar scenario- while trying to mount an eye bolt to the back wall of his house to attach a dog run cable, he drilled into the feed wire to a sub panel. The drill bit mangled wth wire into a sparking, shorting bundle, lucky he didn't electrocute himself. The sparks inside the wall caught some stuff on fire which spread quickly up the ballon-framed century-old schoolhouse wall. Remodel-installed cpvc plumbing melted and put the fire out just as in this instance, then flooded the majority of the kitchen.
 
Similar situation in my area, except it was an old house that had been converted to apartments, and lightning was the culprit. It started a fire in wiring that passed through a closet, which melted the plastic pipe and put the fire out.
 
Back in the 80's, a friend of mine, Terry, was on the local VFD.

Through cooperation with the local phone co, the firemen could blow the town's fire siren by flipping a little accessory toggle switch on their phones.

One morning, while Terry and his wife were at work, an electric blanket that had been inadvertently left on started a fire on the bed.

For one reason or another, apparently the nightstand phone had been used earlier that morning and left setting on the bed.

The bed fire partially melted the phone and shorted the wiring, causing the fire siren to mysteriously blow.

One way or another, by that time smoke was billowing out of the house, making it easy to spot where the FD was needed. They quickly out out the fire, and the house was saved and cleaned up, and Terry still lives there today.

The last I heard, the melted/charred phone was still one display at the firehall!

TRUE story!
 
New ten gauge for 30A is Orange. The yellow is 12 gauge, 20 Amps MAX. Most water heaters have the wiring exposed on the top. Damage from rodents is the reason for breakers. My preference is to wire to a 30A dryer receptacle, then install a dryer cord on the water heater. Saves a lot of time when trouble shooting if you don't have to walk to a panel. Our local AHJ has approved this method. Other locals may not. The most important thing is to make sure the wires are protected from damage such as hanging against the side of the heater.
 

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