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Fire on Worthington (UPDATED)

North Bay fire fighters assess the situation on the roof of a house at 781 Worthington St. W. Photo by Phil Novak.

North Bay fire fighters assess the situation on the roof of a house at 781 Worthington St. W. Photo by Phil Novak.
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A pot of cooking oil ignited when left unattended and caused $60,000 worthy of damage to a home at 781 Worthington St. E, says Randy Vezina, a fire prevention officer with the North Bay Fire Department.

There were no injuries due to the fire, which broke out around 1:30 Sunday afternoon, but a cat died in the blaze.

Vezina said a male tenant in the house had been cooking french fries in the pot of oil when a female friend showed up to take him shopping for groceries.

"He left without turning the stove off and while at the grocery store asked this friend to go back to house and make sure he had turned the stove off," Vezina said.

"But when she returned fire crews were already on the scene."

The oil, Vezina said, had reached its "auto-ignition" point, starting the fire.

And, he added, there's a better and safer way to cook french fries.

"We want people to buy approved deep fryers because they're not that expensive and only allow oil to reach its cooking temperature and not its auto-ignition temperature," Vezina said.

"These cooking oil fires are major causes of fire fatalities in the industrialized world."

Vezina also encourages tenants to purchase personal contents insurance, since property owner insurance does not cover it.

"This particular person didn't have any personal contents insurance," Vezina said.

"We've looked into it and for $14 a month you can get about $15,000 worth of contents coverage."

The fire was ruled accidental, Vezina said.

But he'll be issuing an order to the property owner to upgrade the electrical system in the house, which Vezina described as being "overfused."

"I checked the panel and there were only three branch circuits for the whole house, so the owner will have to bring in a proper electrician, take out an electrical permit and put in a new panel that will bump the house up from 60 amps to 100 amps," Vezina said.

"The electrical system in the house could have potentially caused a fire too because it is so overfused."



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