[Sca-cooks] OT, OOP--Summer warning--not a hoax

[Bronwynmgn at aol.com]

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[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
In a message dated 7/1/2002 7:50:03 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
ekoogler1 at comcast.net writes:


> Bob Penkes of Petroleum Equipment Institute is working on a campaign to try
> and make people aware of fires as a result of "static" at gas pumps. His
> company has researched 150 cases of these fires. His results were very
> surprising:


It should come as no surprise to anyone that static electricity can ignite
gas fumes.  That is why they have those specific instructions right on the
gas pump about how to fill a separate gas container such as many people have
for their lawn mowers.  It says right on the instructions that failure to
follow the directions may cause static electricity to ignite the fumes.  I
have also recently begun seeing a notice posted on pumps about not using cell
phones while pumping gas.

I do doubt the assertion that most of these fires happen to women - although
I could see some women being more likely to get back into the vehicle so as
to protect their hairdo or something, I figure there are a lot more men
filling separate gas containers, and probably an equal amount using cell
phones.


Brangwayna Morgan