Kushal and I decided to cook scallops on the stove top, so we got ourselves an old pot and
filled it about half way with vegetable oil. We heated it up, it got a little too hot. A small flame
appeared in the center of the oil, which we thought was rather cute. Then it became less
cute, as the flame spread across the oils' surface. I grabbed the cover to the pot and put it on
top, but it wasn't enough. The cover blew off the top of the pot and with it, burning oil went all
over the stove top, and the bottom of the cabinets about 2½ feet above. The flames, within
one second or so, roared up out of the pot, and joined the flames already on the cabinets,
making the fire essentially 5 feet high, covering the stove, the counters and the cabinets.
What to do? Well, being poor college kids, we obviously couldn't afford a pot with a handle,
but this 10" wide pot was pouring out flames, it had to be stopped! I did the only thing I could
think of; I grabbed the pot holder (the one you put your hand into) and a saucepan with handle
(ok, we could afford a saucepan with a handle, but not a pot) in the other hand.
I put my pot holder protected hand into the flames, grabbed the pot and slid
it off the stove onto the saucepan. It was a little less than successful. As the pot slid onto the
saucepan, about ½ the burning oil went over the side. The first thing this liquid flame poured
over was my left hand, literally melting the skin away, exposing the white underskin and blood
beneath. As it fell away past my hand, it landed on the linoleum floor, charring a black hole
clean through the linoleum as well. It spread quickly on that surface, and for a quick second,
the flames were 2 feet high and 2 feet wide on the floor. Luckily, the oil cooled quickly once
the surface area was so increased, and the floor fire was out.
Kushal, seeing my left hand melting away as I slid the pot off the stove grabbed the saucepan
handle from me, before I dropped the rest of the oil onto the floor, and he ran with the burning
pot through the living room (leaving multiple droplets of burning oil along the way - melting a
piece of the rug, the chair and the coffee table), and he ran out the door and threw the pot
off the 2nd story balcony into the snow bank below (luckily no one was walking by at that moment).
The rest of the fire quickly went out in the kitchen, and we called the fire department. This
whole event took place over the course of about 8 seconds, and the entire apartment was
completely inundated with thick, black smoke. I had second degree burns on my hands and
Kushal burned off part of his eyelashes. After, I drove myself to the University Health
Services, and they treated my hand and gave me cool drugs (Tylox). Funny thing was that
even though I had severe 2nd degree burns (ie: no nerve damage), there was never
much pain in my hand at all. The giant blistery puss wads is what was the most annoying :(