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The United Kingdom Fire and Rescue Services attended 876,300 fire and false alarm incidents in the 12 months to 30 September 2006 - a slight increase on the previous 12 months. There were 482 fire deaths in this period - down 1% on the previous 12 months. Dwelling fire deaths fell by 9% to 342, the lowest total since records began. However, all fire death figures for 2006 should be treated with caution as they are still provisional and subject to change. Primary fires fell by 5% to 162,000. This is the lowest total since 1985. Within this dwelling fires hit a 25 year low (56,400, down 2%), fires in other buildings - including workplaces and areas where people gather - are at their lowest since 1963 (down 7% to 33,200) and road vehicle fires again fell (by 9% to 60,600) to their lowest total since 1990. Secondary fires rose by 6% to 267,100 as there was a large increase in grassland fires (37%). These fires are closely linked to temperature, with July 2006 being the hottest July on record. Attendances at false alarms dropped by 1% to 436,500. Within this there was a 15% fall in malicious false alarms and a slight decrease in false alarms due to apparatus.

Such was the case for California parents who should not have let their seven-year-old and nine-year-old daughters play in a filled bathtub near a hair dryer, especially when the dryer should not have been plugged in, and the outlet should have had a ground fault circuit interrupter (GFCI). Both children died when the dryer fell into the bathtub.

A British Airways plane carrying 76 passengers suffered a major electrical failure just after taking off, an official accident report said. In what accident investigators described as "a serious incident", the Airbus A319 lost a number of important systems having just left Heathrow for Budapest. The crew reported an audible "clunk" and the flight deck suddenly became very dark as the aircraft was approaching 20,000ft, said the report from the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB).

Heating devices are being blamed for three fires in a six-hour period Wednesday night into early Thursday, prompting state fire officials to urge residents to use caution as the winter season gets underway.

Government statistics show that 10 to 20 people die and 190 are hurt annually by fires caused by faulty blankets.

According to state wildlife official Sunil Kumar, the drunken pachyderm electrocution incident took place last Friday in Chandan Nukat, a village some 240km west of Meghalaya state's capital Shillong. Kumar said: "There would have been more casualties had the villagers not chased them away."

A small electrical fire last month at the Falls Mill Residential Condominium complex sparked a wave of fire- and building-safety inspections that discovered numerous violations city officials are now ordering to be corrected.

The Missouri Division of Fire Safety concluded in December of last year that the cause of the fire remained undetermined. But the report noted that it most likely began in the attic on the north end of the home and that an electrical short circuit in that area could not be eliminated as a possible cause. A maintenance man employed by the home who was working on its furnaces the day of the fire told investigators that he deliberately short-circuited an electrical line that ran through the attic just hours before the fire. He reportedly shorted the wiring because he did not know which switch in a breaker box controlled one of the furnaces he was repairing and wanted to switch that breaker off.

Now, in a bid to prevent a repeat of this tragedy, close friend Michelle Winfield is calling for all electrical and gas appliances at homes for sale to receive an independent inspection so their safety can be certified.