Check Out This Fire Caused By Hand Sanitizer Left In A Car

A few years back there was a viral post about not leaving water bottles in your vehicle on a hot, sunny day because the water bottle could act as a magnifying glass. If you remember from science class if the light is focused it gets very hot and can start a fire. It's the same principle inside your vehicle.

I can actually verify this is a real thing that happened to me in my Jeep with the top and doors off. I had been off-roading and stopped to eat lunch and was sitting in my Jeep with a water bottle sitting on my dash. The sunlight coming in through my windshield was magnified by the water bottle and actually burned a hole in my shirt. Until that happened I would have said the water bottle fire was a myth.

I kinda felt the same way about this hand sanitizer causing a car fire story, but I was wrong. Check out the picture below from a fire department in Wisconson. It's of a car that had a bottle of hand sanitizer in the door pocket. The sunlight and heat caused the hand sanitizer to explode and catch fire. It melted the door panel and caused a lot of damage.

“By its nature, most hand sanitizer is alcohol-based and therefore flammable,” the Western Lakes Fire Department said. “Keeping it in your car during hot weather, exposing it to the sun, and particularly being next to open flame while smoking in vehicles or grilling while enjoying this weekend can lead to disaster.”

Basically, hand sanitizer has as much alcohol in it as those flaming shots you may or may not have done in college. Think how easy it was to light those...you don't want that catching fire in your vehicle.

In addition, there's have been a few stories of people using hand sanitizer and then getting near an open flame without letting the sanitizer dry completely. It ignited and cause serious burns. So, if you're grilling out this weekend you might want to keep the hand sanitizer far away from the grill and make sure it's dried before flipping those burgers.