House fire caused by strong winds? Huh?

[burnt03]

Saw on the news tonight that a local family lost their home in a house fire. Near the end of the story, the owner pointed to the wood stove and said "the wind was so heavy, the wind blew back into it".

(link here, statement at about 1:35 - (broken link removed to http://www.chbcnews.ca/west+kelowna+family+with+no+fire+insurance+left+with+nothing+after+blaze/6442529668/story.html))

Is this even possible? I'm a straight-up newbie trying to convince my wife that we should buy a wood stove, and a story like that won't help.

 

[BrowningBAR]

"Johnny" sounds like someone looking to pass blame on to anything. Guess he should have listened to his wife.

And I am willing to bet that stove had an interesting install.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

burnt03, if you look at my signature line you'll see we have burned wood for a few moons now. We have never had a problem with high winds. We have never had a problem with creosote (well, excepting that one winter when we burned green wood). We have never had a problem with chimney fires.

Burning wood can be just as safe as burning that gas or oil furnace. Even less so when you consider some of those homes that have been blown apart when a gas leak occurred and their furnace kicked on... The number one key to burning wood is to cut, split and stack that wood a long time before you need it. Even if you buy wood, you need to buy it at least one year before it will be burned. This is where most new wood burners make their mistakes and then try to find all sorts of reasons why it is the stove or the chimney or poor draft or whatever. Just ask a few of the fellows on this forum that learned their lesson. Most can hardly believe the difference it makes when one has stockpiled wood long enough so it dries. Still, new people continue to buy a stove, install it and then look for wood. That just don't work worth a hoot.

 

[begreen]

This does not appear to have anything to do with the wind or the wood. Blaming the wind is just looking for another scapegoat for his ignorance. The stove appears to have an 8" flue collar, choked down to 6". with the pipe aluminum taped to what appears to be thin-wall galvanized. Though to be fair it is hard to identify the pipe exactly. I suspect the actual cause was not the wind at all. My guess would be bad clearances. The fact that he set up a home like this with a 16 mo child is scary and reckless. Methinks he needs to spend a less time getting advice from his buddies at Whiskey-Jack's Pub and some real time here at Hearth.com.

 

[BrowningBAR]

This does not appear to have anything to do with the wind or the wood. Blaming the wind is just looking for another scapegoat for his ignorance. The stove appears to have an 8" flue collar, choked down to 6". with the pipe aluminum taped to what appears to be thin-wall galvanized. Though to be fair it is hard to identify the pipe exactly. I suspect the actual cause was not the wind at all. My guess would be bad clearances. The fact that he set up a home like this with a 16 mo child is scary and reckless. Methinks he needs to spend a less time getting advice from his buddies at Whiskey-Jack's Pub and some real time here at Hearth.com.

"I'm a lot older than you I know what I'm talking about."

Probably a better chance of getting the wife on here.

 

[jeff_t]

Well, the wind likely did contribute. By increasing draft in a leaky old stove and getting the pipe too hot in a shoddy installation, probably even starting a chimney fire. That probably looked like the wind blowing the fire back in.

 

[andybaker]

yes, I'm sure there's more to this story.

 

[BrowningBAR]

yes, I'm sure there's more to this story.

"...and I only used a coffee cup of gasoline to get the fire started. Sure, I spilled some, but it's the wind I tell you, the wind."