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Articles Accidents Caused By Smoking Cigarettes

Accidents Caused By Smoking Cigarettes

Principal Author / Publisher:Safetyhow Admin
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Body
Cigarettes 

A cigarette consists of dried, cured and finely chopped tobacco leaves. With other chemicals added, the resultant mixture is rolled into a paper wrapper. The paper is designed to control the rate at which the cigarette burns. Chemicals in the paper ensure the cigarette continues to burn and does not extinguish on its own. The temperature of a cigarette while not being smoked runs 1112 degrees Fahrenheit in the center—and 752 degrees Fahrenheit on the sides of the cigarette.



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Cigarettes and Human Life

A 2000 study by the University of California Davis reported that, approximately 100,000 fires each year in the United States were smoking-related and approximately 30 percent of the deaths per year were due to smoking-related fires. In 2004, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) reported that deaths by fire associated with smoking activities increased by 19 percent in 1999 from prior years. The Office of the California State Fire Marshal also reported that from 1992 to 2002 cigarette-caused fires killed over 97 civilians.



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Cigarettes and Property Damage

Due to the burning nature of a cigarette, one of the most common cigarette-related property-loss accidents is fire. Destruction of property from fires caused by cigarettes runs in the millions of dollars annually. A combined report in 2007 posted by the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin provided loss estimates for 2001 through 2005 for the states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin. Property losses for those states were over $139 million.

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Cigarettes and Automobile Accidents

Inattention while driving is a major contributor to automobile accidents. Smoking-related tasks are considered in the category of driver inattentiveness as noted in a 2006 report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration titled "The Impact of Driver Inattention on Near-Crash/Crash Risk." Drivers who are engaged in tasks not related to driving, such as reaching for a cigarette, lighting or extinguishing the cigarette and smoking while driving, increase the risk of having an accident by two-to-three times that of normal driving.



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Cigarettes and Forest Fires

Careless cigarette use is often the cause for forest-fire accidents. In 2007, a fire in the Kula Forest Reserve destroyed close to 2,300 acres of land, burning for seven days. The fire was traced to a cigarette butt, which had been improperly disposed. In 2009, a discarded cigarette ignited a wildfire in Texas, burning over 400 acres. In 2002 in Lake Tahoe, California, a cigarette tossed from the cabin of the gondola, which carries riders to the top of the mountain, started a fire, which burned 672 acres of forest.  
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