By Bob Anderson
The Advocate
LIVINGSTON, La. — Hand-rolled cigarettes, which don’t fall under a new state law requiring “fire-safe cigarettes” sold in Louisiana be made with fire-retardant paper, may have caused a fatal fire in Livingston, state Fire Marshal Butch Browning said Wednesday.
Tuesday’s fire was the 10th to take a life in Louisiana so far this year and the eighth in less than a week’s time, said Marc Reech of the state Fire Marshal’s Office.
An autopsy showed that Charles Hartley Abbott, of Livingston, died of smoke inhalation, Livingston Parish Coroner Ron Coe said Wednesday afternoon.
Abbott, 59, was bedridden and in hospice care, according to the State Fire Marshal’s Office.
The fire began in the room where Abbott was sleeping, investigators reported.
Browning said that “we are looking hard” at the possibility that it was caused by a cigarette, but investigators continue to check out some other possibilities.
Abbott was a heavy smoker who rolled his own cigarettes, the fire marshal said.
A state law that just took effect at the beginning of the year requires manufactured cigarettes to be made with a safer type of paper that tends not to keep smoldering if the cigarette isn’t being puffed, Browning said.
Hand-rolled cigarettes don’t have that requirement, he added.
If a hand-rolled cigarette is dropped in a bed, it is more likely to cause a fire, Browning said.
The mobile home in which Abbott died wasn’t equipped with a smoke detector.
The lack of such a device reduces the chance of someone waking up in the event of a fire, the fire marshal said.
Abbott’s body was found in his bed and it didn’t appear that he had tried to get out of bed, which would be consistent with a smoldering fire, Browning said Wednesday.
Livingston Parish Fire Chief Kirk Duffy said the portion of the mobile home where the body was found was filled with smoke and engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived.
“We got there within a couple of minutes of getting the call,” Duffy said.
Neighbors told arriving firefighters they suspected Abbott was in the trailer but didn’t know in which part, the fire chief said.
Neither neighbors nor firefighters could get to Abbott in time to save him, but residents did awaken Abbot’s next-door neighbor after the fire spread to the neighbor’s trailer, Duffy said.
The fire chief said 15 to 20 firefighters from several departments helped to fight the fire just after 3 p.m. Tuesday at 20230 Julie St. in Livingston.
There were no other injuries, he said.
Reech said most of the fatal fires in the state this year have been related to cold weather.
He advised that people using space heaters maintain a clearance of at least 3 feet between such heaters and combustible material.
Copyright 2010 Capital City Press