Hampshire and Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue Service (HIWFRS) is warning members of the community to ‘turn off the heat before they eat’ this Christmas as they continue to raise awareness of kitchen safety with their Recipe for Success COOK campaign.
Whether cooking a small Christmas dinner or cooking a huge family feast, nobody wants spoiled sprouts and a ruined roast this Christmas, so the Fire Service wants to remind people to ‘keep looking when cooking’.
50% of all accidental fires in the home across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight over the last few years started in the kitchen. When life gets busy it’s easy for everyone to get distracted, With Christmas coming up people may be planning to cook for extra family and friends. Whether it’s presents, playing party games or enjoying a few festive drinks, all that festive fun means it’s even easier to get distracted while cooking, so don’t leave your Christmas dinner unattended.
With the Recipe for Success COOK campaign HIWFRS hopes to simplify kitchen safety with their easy to remember list of ingredients:
CLEAR – Keep tea towels, cloths and electrical leads away from the oven and hob.
OVEN – Switch off the oven and hob when you’ve finished cooking and remove pans from the heat.
OIL – A build-up of cooking oil/grease can increase the risk of cooking fires so clean regularly.
KEEP – Keep looking when cooking.
Lone pensioners were found to be involved in over a third of the cooking-related fires across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. Over the last couple of months the Fire Service has been trialling a targeted campaign aimed at over 65s in the Southsea area whilst also hoping to raise public awareness of kitchen fire safety.
Southsea firefighters and members of the Service’s Community Safety team have been busy raising awareness of kitchen fire safety in Portsmouth which has led to a huge increase in requests for the free home fire safety (Safe and Well) visits HIWFRS offer amongst over 65s in the area. From supermarket community engagement sessions to group fire safety talks aimed at older people, the team have given out face to face advice as well as Recipe for Success campaign booklets which included free recipe cards and top tips. Campaign booklets and awareness posters were also given to local foodbanks and world food stores in the Southsea area.
HIWFRS’ Head of Prevention Karen Farr said:
“As a Service we look carefully at the different risks our communities face across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight to ensure we play our role in raising awareness of these dangers.
“Nationally each year we know that cooking causes more accidental fires in the home than anything else and sadly our local incident rates mirror the national statistics.
“Through the Recipe for Success COOK campaign we hope to highlight the dangers of unsafe cooking habits to hopefully help prevent unnecessary incidents and fires in the home.”
Visit the Recipe for Success area of the HIWFRS website to download some free recipe cards or for more top tips.
The Service also offers a free online home fire safety check which takes minutes to complete and generates a free personalised fire safety plan for your home.
Stay safe and keep your festive fun fire-free with the HIWFRS Christmas checklist.