Cooking appliances responsible for almost half of house fires

October 14, 2022

The Office for National Statistics has released its annual detailed analysis of fires attended by fire and rescue services, England, April 2021 to March 2022.

Cooking appliances were responsible for 45% of accidental dwelling fires, but only 11% of fire-related fatalities in the year ending March 2022.

Smoking materials showed the reverse pattern, accounting for only seven per cent of accidental dwelling fires, but resulting in 24% of fire-related fatalities.

Almost half (49%) of all fires occurred where the time of call was between 16:00 and 22:00, but the number of fire-related fatalities was roughly equal between day and night hours.

The findings also revealed that by combining IRS and English Housing Survey data, Home Office statisticians have calculated that you are around nine times more likely to die in a fire if you do not have a working smoke alarm in your home.

Fire-related fatality rate per million is higher for men and older people. For men the fatality rate was 5.9 per million population, compared to 3.6 per million population for women. For men aged 65 to 79 the fatality rate was 13.3 per million population while the equivalent rate in the same age group for women was 7.8 per million. For those aged 80 and over, the rate for men was 20.2 per million and for women was 19.3 per million.

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