Fireworks to blame for numerous OKC house, grass fires

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — Oklahoma City firefighters say illegally-used fireworks caused multiple house fires and more than 20 grass fires in the city on the Fourth of July this year.

Firefighters say, in many cases, the fires were caused by improperly thrown-away fireworks.

“Yesterday, July 4th, leading into the overnight hours, up to around 6 a.m. this morning, we responded to 371 total emergency calls,” Scott Douglas with the Oklahoma City Fire Department told News 4. “I would say approximately 50 calls were directly related to fireworks.”

One of those calls included a house fire in Southwest Oklahoma City, where firefighters say the homeowner put recently-used fireworks in their trash bin.

“And where's the trash? It's directly under the eave of the house,” Douglas said. “So they go inside, they go to sleep thinking everything is safe and we're good to go. And an hour or two hours goes by that those sparks are still alive in those fireworks and it catches other combustibles in the trash can. The trash can catch on fire. Those flames extend into the eave of your home. And now we're responding to a house fire.”

Douglas said at least one or two other overnight house fires were likely caused by fireworks, but investigators have not made any final determinations yet.

He said firefighters responded to 21 grass fires as well.

Douglas said Thursday afternoon’s heavy rainstorms may have given some people a false sense of security when it came to the grass fire risk.

“We still respond to grass fires actually while it's still raining or we just had a rain,” Douglas said. “A lot of people may think, ‘oh, we have rain, we're okay.’ Well, that dry vegetation sometimes takes a little bit to green back up. And that's what we saw last night. Even with the rain showers moving through, that vegetation was still dry. So these fireworks are landing and random fields and catch and grass fires catching fields and grass on fire still.”

He says all of those calls are prime example of why it is illegal to use firework in Oklahoma City’s city limits.

“Some of these houses are in close proximity,” Douglas said. “When you light these fireworks off, they shoot over people's houses, people's backyards. Who knows where they go? It's just too dangerous.”