Fire service dealing with plastic bins on fire due to unquenched disposable barbecues

Cork City Fire Brigade has appealed to the public to be extra vigilant when it comes to the disposal of single-use barbecues and to always be aware of the possibility of fires spreading to homes and businesses.

Victor Shine, Second Officer with the Cork City Fire Brigade, told The Echo the fire service was busy at the moment, and he appealed to the public to always be careful when with barbecues.

“We have had a couple of occasions lately of people putting disposable barbecues in plastic bins, and the bins then going on fire, so we’re appealing to people disposing of single-use barbecues to be certain they are completely quenched and completely cool before putting them in the bin,” Mr Shine said.

Mr Shine added that people should always be extremely careful when using barbecues, especially near areas which are vulnerable to gorse fires.

“Gorse fires are a particular recurring problem, and we are appealing to people, especially groups of young people, to always be aware of how quickly a fire can spread, and how quickly homes and businesses can be endangered by a fire which has gone out of control,” he said.

He said the summer can be a busy time for the fire service, and Cork City Fire Brigade had had a particularly busy night on Wednesday of this week, dealing with a number of incidents across the city, including grass fires, car fires, alarm activations and a house fire.

He said that in one incident on Wednesday night a car had gone on fire near a house.

All incidents were successfully dealt with by crews from Cork City Fire Brigade.