Did black mulch spontaneously combust, causing Medina house fire?
A Facebook post shared nearly 90,000 times says a Medina home caught on fire due to spontaneous combustion. We consulted experts to verify this claim.
Author: Brandon Simmons
July 18, 2018
MEDINA, OH – There’s been much debate on Facebook regarding a post where a user claims her neighbor's home caught fire due to spontaneous combustion.
Fortunately, the damage wasn’t too serious, and no one was hurt. But could black mulch really be the cause?
The post has been shared nearly 90,000 times and has over 11,000 comments, with many offering their opinion about what really happened.
We went Medina Fire Chief Bob Painter for answers.
“When they did the investigation, it seemed like it started from the mulch area,” said Painter.
While it started in the mulch, he didn’t say the mulch spontaneously combusted.
“The natural decomposing process generates heat. And if it’s the right moisture, the right heat, and it gets enough wind, it could self-combust,” he said.
Before you jump to conclusions, he added this statement, “I really can’t remember any that weren’t started by cigarette butts or they get mulch too close to electrical decorations and that catches it when it’s dried out.”
Mulch has the ability to spontaneously combust. This typically happens when it’s piled many feet high at manufacturing facilities. Workers rotate and move the mulch using bulldozers to prevent it from igniting in flames.
Painter says it’s much harder for this to happen at your home.
“If you do the normal 2-4 inches like they recommend, you should have no problems. If you start getting 6-8 inches deep, you could have some spontaneous combustion.”
Mulch CAN spontaneously combust. But that’s probably not the case in this situation.
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Can mulch spontaneously combust, set houses on fire?
Mulch can spontaneously burst into flames on rare occasions, experts say
July 18, 2018
Carla Field
Digital Managing Editor
File photo SOURCE: File photo, Assistant Fire Marshal Mike Hughes, Johnson City Fire Department
GREENVILLE, S.C. —
An image posted on an Upstate Facebook page Tuesday showing a house fire caused by the spontaneous combustion of landscaping mulch has led to a lot of questions and some very harsh comments.
The picture, repeatedly shared and heavily commented upon, was first posted July 14 by a woman in Medina, Ohio. A similar photo from a different incident is posted above.
The picture shows aluminum siding burned and melted off part of a garage above a landscaped area covered with black mulch.
The post said, “This is so scary. This was the result of my friend’s black mulch, that she had just pit down on July 4. (The) fire department said it was spontaneous combustion from the heat. This side of her house gets the hot afternoon sun.
“Black mulch is dyed by way of a chemical. The morning dew and hot sun set the mulch on fire. Her neighbor was doing dishes and noticed it out their window, ran over and put it out with the garden house. Praise God they were in the right spot at the right time, or this could have been a lot worse.”
Many people on Facebook questioned whether mulch can spontaneously catch fire, or they blamed the fire on an electrical receptacle in the burned area of the garage.
So, is there evidence or expert opinions to back up what the poster of the picture claimed?
Science, technology and news site RedOrbit.com, based in Nashville, Tenn., reported on the spontaneous combustion of mulch in August 2007, after wood chips on an Arlington, Texas playground burst into flames.
School officials said 99 degree temperatures caused the mulch to spontaneously combust.
A house fire in an upscale Chicago subdivision in 2007 was also blamed on mulch that spontaneously combusted. The fire did $175,000 worth of damage.
Thousands of mulch fires are reported annually in every state, Mark Finucane, with the Johnson City, Tennessee fire department, wrote on FireEngineering.com.
Finucane wrote, “Our department is frequently called out to extinguish smoldering fires in bark mulch. Often, this burning mulch is up against the side of a residential or commercial structure, where it is likely to be unnoticed. This burning/smoldering mulch may eventually ignite the underneath of the siding and then spread into the structural components of the building and cause extensive damage.”
He said one of the mulch fires his department responded to in April 2005 was at a Ramada Hotel.
“The first-arriving company observed smoke issuing from the roofline of a two-story hotel building of ordinary construction. On further investigation, personnel discovered that the synthetic stucco exterior wall of a support column was turning brown,” Finucane wrote. “Fire had charred the interior wood frame of the column and was starting to extend into the void space under the roof. The deep and extensive charring indicated the fire had been ‘working’ for an extended period.”
Johnson City firefighters also responded in March 2007 to a house fire that started in landscaping mulch that was placed up against an exterior wall. The fire did $8,000 worth of damage to the home.
SafetyInsurance.com says any mulch that is piled too deeply, more than just a few inches, can build up heat and spontaneously catch fire. Mulch fires start more readily when the weather is hot and it has been dry for an extended time. Factors such as below-average rainfall, dry conditions, warm temperatures and high winds increase the risk of mulch fires.
Alan Perkins, Washington, Ohio, fire marshal, says there are precautions to take to minimize the risk of mulch fires:
Use non-combustible mulch, such as rock or pea gravel, around the gas meter and next to combustible portions of a structure.
Maintain mulch at a depth of 2 to 4 inches to eliminate the chance of spontaneous combustion.
Maintain a minimum of a 6 inches of clearance between landscaping mulch beds and other combustible items such as buildings, shrubs, etc.
Do not discard cigarettes or other smoking materials on the ground or throw them out of your vehicle.
Stir and wet down mulch during extremely hot and dry conditions.
Ensure proper clearance to electrical devices, such as decorative lighting, by following the manufacturer’s instructions.