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By Newsweek Editors
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By the time help arrived at Helen Carnegie's apartment in Brooklyn, it was too late. Carnegie, a 25-year-old film student at New York University, had already died from smoke inhalation in an early-morning fire. As firefighters put out the blaze in her room, they found the telltale remains of three candles by her bed. Those candles most likely ignited the inferno that claimed Carnegie's life.
Stories like Carnegie's are part of an alarming new trend. As shoppers snap up tapers and votives, the candle industry has doubled to $2.3 billion since 1995. These days, specialty shops offer such holiday novelties as eggnog-scented candles and burning Stars of David. But as the wax-and-wick industry booms, so do rates of fires and fatalities caused by careless candle lovers.
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The national fire count has dropped over the past decade. But candle fires hit an 18-year high of 11,600 in 1997, according to the National Fire Protection Association's latest tally. Helen Carnegie's death was the 13th this year caused by candle fires in New York City, up from about five a year since 1995. In Chicago, fires caused by candles surged from 33 in 1995 to 60 last year; fatalities leaped from one death to eight in the same period. Capt. Paul Hunter of the Orange County Fire Department is also seeing more candle fires. "It's a serious nationwide problem," says New York City Fire Commissioner Thomas Von Essen.
Religious rituals and flammable decor usually boost the risk of candle fires during the holidays. But the danger now spans the whole year, says Kenneth Wideman of the Chicago Fire Department: "There's a public fascination for candles. People are lighting them year-round now." The fascination has been fueled in part by celebrity decorators and magazines. Two of Chicago's fatalities came last year when a 74-year-old woman heard a talk-show host say that candles create a cozy ambience. According to fire-department records, the woman lit a candle in her apartment and left the room. Her bed caught fire, and the smoke spread to her neighbors' apartment. She escaped, but her neighbors died of smoke inhalation. Maryann McDermott of the National Candle Association encourages consumer vigilance: "We're very concerned about fires related to candles. We need to make it clear that this is still fire."
Fire officials can't ban candles; they can only warn people not to doze carelessly as their aromatherapy candles burn. They recommend keeping candles in fireproof holders away from pets, children and flammable materials. Let's hope that common sense will keep a popular trend from becoming a nationwide four-alarm nightmare.
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