Last week a central vacuum was used in a manner that should never be repeated. In Washington, D.C., a fire forced the German Embassy to evacuate its workers. The evacuation was prompted when spreading smoke was detected throughout the building.(You can read the entire AP article here).  

Apparently, the fire was caused when an Embassy worker used the building’s central vacuum system to suck up very hot embers from a fireplace. The AP described the cause this way: “The employee apparently had attached a cleaning tool to a wall inlet for the system and then let the powerful vacuum go to work on the embers.” Fortunately, the fire was contained within the central vacuum canister, thereby limiting the damage. MD General Manager Grant Olewiler stated, “Obviously it could not have been a plastic central vacuum unit as this would have done considerably more damage.” While the heavy-duty metal central vacuum unit, consistent with all of MD’s units, certainly prevented much more destruction, the moral of the story is: DO NOT SUCK UP HOT FIREPLACE EMBERS WITH YOUR CENTRAL VACUUM.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 28th, 2006 at 5:51 pm and is filed under CV News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.