Cup of soup blamed for blaze
The instant soup did it.
A fire that tore through a one-story house near Charleston and Decatur boulevards on Wednesday probably was caused by a cup of instant soup that was overheated and then discarded in the trash, said Tim Szymanski, spokesman for the Las Vegas Fire Department.
The fire caused about $200,000 worth of damage to the house, at 4601 Del Monte Ave., but no one was hurt in the blaze.
Firefighters, who were called to the house about 11 a.m., arrived to find flames coming from the roof. Firefighters extinguished the blaze about an hour after they arrived, and the Red Cross helped the residents.
Szymanski said the residents used a microwave to heat a cup of instant soup but forgot to add water to the soup. The soup cup caught fire, and the residents discarded it in the trash. The trash was taken outside and placed next to the house.
But the instant soup was still hot, and the wind outside caused the soup in the trash to catch fire, Szymanski said.
"Conditions were just perfect to have this flare-up," he said.
The fire spread then to the house.
He said flare-up fires are more likely to occur around the Fourth of July, when people throw fireworks into the trash without properly extinguishing them.
