Had to do a bit of fire investigation

[Nomad]

Daughter sends me this pic. It’s her makeup box in a spare bedroom , i called her and asked “ any curling irons or straightener on that table ? “ “ nope don’t own one . “

Told her leave everything in place and I’d be by in the morning , although I pretty much had it figured out already , just needed to confirm my suspicions. Walking up stairs I told her fiancé, “makeup mirror “ walked into the room and there it sat facing the box . See there’s no blinds or curtains in that room and we had some sunny days last week , put that with the fact that there’s always one of those mirrors where they paint their faces , along with the placement and smoldering type of burn , then  eliminating heat sources ,smoking ,cooking , electrical sources left one thing . Mirror faced South window a few feet away , and was in direct line with the box a few inches away .

The suns rays concentrated on one small spot and as the Fire smolders and burns away the cardboard ,it makes a hole then the rays aren’t touching it anymore and luckily it then went out . 

[Lawdwaz]

Amazing.........(not your investigative skills necessarily)   but how that can happen.  Fascinating what that wonderful big old sun can do.

During my years in the cleaning business I cleaned up lots of fires and the cause/origin were always interesting to me.  Numerous times I had insurance adjusters asking my opinion after I'd been on the job a day or two. 

You did good Larry, you haven't lost a step........... 

 

[First-light]

Wow!

[Nomad]

2 hours ago, First-light said:

Wow!

And lucky ! Not many combustible materials in that room , not sure what would have happened if the box took, off . Nothing much else near it , glad we didn’t have to find out .

I had a “ clue “ as many years ago her sister brought one of the big round ones outside ,in an effort to watch herself on the trampoline. It burned a hole in the trampoline. 
 

oh speaking of her sister she called me five minutes prior , to me getting the box photo, she was walking by this house fire in Buffalo at the time  . Odd coincidence.

Edited February 14, 2021 by Nomad

[mowin]

Yrs ago my sister had a bird feeder that hung on the windows sill. It had a two way mirror so you could see the birds and your movement wouldn't scare them away.  One Sunday morning she was sitting there watching the birds, and suddenly the roll of paper towels started smoking.  Bird feeder went in the trash. 

Edited February 14, 2021 by mowin

[2012_taco]

The sun is a powerful source of energy! When I was working for the town I got called to investigate a couple of complaints. The 1st was a neighbor complaining that their siding was melting, turns out the neighbor to the north put on an addition and the south facing windows were reflecting the suns rays onto their garage walls and melting their vinyl siding! I told them unfortunately there wasn't any code violations but I would strongly suggest they replace the siding with Hardy plank (cement based) siding! The 2nd was where a resident complained to the Engineering dept that they had a gas leak in their front yard and it was killing the grass. There was no leak so Eng. dept. called me help investigate. It was their front(south facing) windows. The windows were Argon gas filled low e windows and the sun was reflecting onto the lawn and some bushes. You could see the grass was burned in a square shape, obviously from the adjacent window! They didn't believe me, but putting a screen in from of the window resolved the problem. I have the same problem with the side door of my garage, the glass reflects the sun onto the grass and starts to burn it, so I when we water the flowers we make sure to water the grass by that door. 

[Nomad]

On a side note. The summer after graduating high school ( I actually did...) a couple friends and I went into the house painting business . Well one house we had to remove some single pane storm windows, so we carefully set them on the front lawn . Left about ten  brown grass rectangles in the front lawn . 

Edited February 16, 2021 by Nomad