LFR: Outlet adapters caused two fires in one week.LUBBOCK, TX (KCBD) -
Lubbock Fire Rescue wants you to be aware of a risk right in your home. They say two recent local house fires has been traced to outlet adapters.
The first fire happened last Thursday and fortunately no one was injured.
But a woman is in critical condition at UMC after a fire that happened early Sunday morning.
In both cases, those residents had window AC units plugged in to outlet adapters.
While outlet adapters may be a cheap alternative to re-wiring older homes, LFR is asking Lubbock residents never to use these adapters.
They say a licensed electrician should be your first call, so we talked to the owner of CMW electrical, Chester Walker.
He says they become dangerous when they are plugged into high energy appliances for long periods of time.
"Microwave, window unit, air conditioners, bathroom heaters, that's a high energy item, when you've got two pronged plugs in the house, you've only got two wires to all your stuff," Walker said.
He says an arc fault breaker is one option.
"It's like having an electrician looking at the wiring 24 hours...it senses the leakage of the electricity or the signature of the arcing and it interrupts and turns the circuit off," Walker said.
A safer option is the ground fault circuit.
"On a two wire system, you can put a ground fault in front of the circuit as your first plug on the circuit and that allows us to put three pronged plugs throughout the house," said Walker.
While he says this is safer, it does not add a ground wire and that is the safest measure you can take.
"You want a good solid grounded circuit because an air conditioner, it uses pretty much the whole circuit," Walker said. "There's just not enough metal here to carry that load."
LFR says extension cords should never be used with AC units, either.
Neither home that caught fire had smoke detectors.
LFR says most fire-related injuries can be avoided by keeping smoke detectors up and running.
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