rags

Bend Fire & Rescue crews were dispatched to a report of a possible structure fire at Broken Top Bottle Shop Thursday morning at 4am .Crews arriving on scene saw smoke in the building and forced entry into the business and found a small sprinkler controlled fire in the dining area. The sprinkler system set off all alarms in the building alerting occupants in the apartments above the business. Residence evacuated their apartments with assistance of Bend Police Department as Bend Fire Crews arrived on scene. Crews insured the fire was extinguished and ventilated the business to reduce smoke damage.  

The sprinkler system extinguished the fire which started in the dining room from kitchen rags placed on a table in laundry bags. The cause of the fire was spontaneous combustion from laundered rags which had  kitchen oils on them and were not separated after being dried. Because the rags were in the laundry bags and were not seperated, the heat from the rags raised to the level high enough to ignite the bags of linen. This is more likely to occur in restaurants, spas and businesses where linens are used to clean up combustible substances like oils. Suggested laundry safety guidelines state separating rags after being laundered is important to avoid spontaneous combustion fires.

The fire damage to the business was minimal due to the immediate extinguishment of the fire by the sprinkler system. The fire was extinguished by one sprinkler head. On average, fires are controlled by the activation of one or two sprinkler heads which not only extinguish the fire but reduce water, fire and smoke damage. Because the system was properly maintained and serviced this fire was quickly extinguished and avoided a possible larger fire in the business and extension to above residential apartments.

All residents were able to return to their apartments within an hour.