Cooking is, by far, the leading cause of all home fires and home fire injuries. Thanksgiving Day has proven to be a particularly dangerous day; the average number of fires nearly doubles. A unique risk during Thanksgiving is turkey fryers. There are 5 risks involved with frying a turkey:

  1. Turkey fryers can easily tip over spilling hot oil across a large area.
  2. An overfilled cooking pot will cause oil to spill over when the turkey is put inside.
  3. A partially frozen turkey will cause hot oil to splatter when put in the pot.
  4. Without thermostat controls, turkey fryers can overheat oil to the point of starting a fire.
  5. The sides of the cooking pot, lid and pot handles can get dangerously hot.

The U.S. Center for Product Safety Commission (CPSC) created a video you can share to illustrate these risks.