Did you know those portable gas cans occasionally explode when tilted at a certain angle? The source of the spark could easily be static from your clothing or friction from pouring the gas. How often does this happen? More than it should! I’ve done the research and found plenty of lawsuits, yet the companies continue to ignore the dangers. Before you grab your little red can of gas to refill your lawnmower or other whatnot, be sure to read on. And at the end of this post, you’ll find a video from the Today Show. For your safety, PLEASE take this seriously.
We bought a sailboat last spring and spent most of the summer on it. The children were with friends when our accident happened, so this account only includes me and my husband. It was July, and we had just sailed into Beaufort, South Carolina. Immediately after hooking our boat to a mooring ball, we had to evacuate due to an air show about to start over the water. We hopped into our dinghy and motored to shore to find some art booths set up and plenty of people around. We enjoyed the afternoon walking around downtown and waited until we got the clear to go back onto the water. We had driven our SUV there the night before, and we planned to leave our boat that night to join our children at our friends’ house. Already packed, we just needed to do a few things on the boat before heading out.
When we arrived back at our dinghy, we found the gas container disconnected, and it had leaked slightly into the bottom of the small boat. It was the first time we had used it since buying the sailboat, and my husband said he’d have to buy a few things and fix it later. We just needed to clean up the spill so it wouldn’t get in the water and then lock up the boat. With another long drive ahead of us, we just wanted to leave.
We got back to the boat, and my husband cleaned the spill. Then he asked me to help him pour the gas from the can into a larger one. We were standing in the cockpit, and it had been hours since the boat motor had been turned on. I took hold of the funnel, and he began to pour. We were almost finished when the gas can exploded in his hands, and the entire cockpit went up in flames. I jumped to the back of the boat while slapping a flame on my sundress, and my husband jumped to the side of the boat. His feet had been on fire for a few seconds. Our first instinct was to jump from the boat, but with the flames no longer on our bodies, we both turned our attention to the burning cockpit. My husband was near the door to the boat, where a fire extinguisher was attached on the inside. He quickly grabbed it and put out the fire. All of this happened within seconds, so he got the fire out before any damage happened to the boat. Since there had been an air show, DNR (Department of Natural Resources) officers were everywhere on the water. Seeing the explosion in the air, they immediately started toward us and called for ambulances.
We were VERY blessed in more ways than one. For instance, if my husband had been standing behind the gas can instead of to the side, it would have blown him back. (That’s how a lot of deaths happen with these can explosions.) Also, we can’t forget about the can of gas sitting in the cockpit–the one we were pouring gas into. It was full, and it was surrounded by fire. If it had exploded, there would not have been anything left of us or the boat. It would have gone full Hollywood! With the cockpit in flames, my husband was able to see a clear path to the cabin, and a DNR boat got to us quickly and rushed us to the ambulances on shore. We really came out blessed. We’ll take first and second-degree burns, along with flash ones, over death any day.
Without an obvious source for a spark, our accident intrigued everyone around us. While we were at the hospital, DNR officers boarded our boat and took pictures for their report. The staff of the nearby marina grabbed a few things from the boat and locked it up before stopping by the hospital. Although we all understand gasoline, in general, is dangerous, no one seemed to know why the can exploded. It wasn’t until I started doing some research a few days later that I realized this is quite common–yet not common knowledge. In fact, it can happen to anyone–at any time. Even filling a snowmobile tank in the winter can cause an explosion. It’s not about the heat. It’s about the can.
The manufacturers know about the problem, yet they choose to ignore it. The simple solution would be to add a flame arrestor to every can. A flame arrestor–or flame trap–is a small metal device that stops fuel combustion by extinguishing the flame. The old metal gas cans had them, and some liquor bottles now have them, along with charcoal lighter fluid. It’s an easy, inexpensive fix!
So, now we’re throwing out all of our gas cans and replacing them with ones that include the arrestor, and I strongly advise you do the same. I found plenty on Amazon and will include the links at the bottom of this post. I’m only going to post one picture of my husband’s feet as he left the hospital, because I want to keep this PG. In the end, he had to have surgery, and they grafted pigs’ skin over his burns. He took pictures every day, and they’re gory. The picture below looks great. A few hours later his toes had huge blisters over them, and everything swelled. I just got a few burns and was able to drive that night.
The irony is that I had done a lot of research on burns last year for Unexpected Beginning, and I had planned to do more for Unexpected Legends. Well, now I’m confident my information will be accurate when it comes to writing about burns. I even got to speak to more than one burn specialist. It’s a silver lining, along with God’s blessing over us that day.
Be sure to watch this Today Show video. It will help explain things as well. Here’s some safe cans on Amazon:
