For some time I lived in a city in the North of England. It was full of terraced brick houses. When I wasn’t working, I went for long walks along the river or across the soggy meadows surrounding the city. The only friend I made in eight months was a computer science graduate a few years older than me. He was a freelancer and every month he received a small check from America for a music program he had written. Most of the time played tennis or his guitar, because there wasn’t much else to do. He’s now a big advocate of bitcoins and vociferously opposed to vaccinations.
The market square was surrounded by gray Victorian buildings. They were more interesting than the brick houses but didn’t make the place feel any more cheerful. One Sunday, the fire department gave a demonstration on fire safety. They instructed the onlookers to stay well back. They put a large pan filled with cooking oil on a metal table, then a fireman dressed in a protective gear set it on fire. This was a realistic demonstration. A lot of the local cooking involved frying potatoes in hot oil. The flames were at least two feet high. Another firefighter explained that first, they were going to show us what not to do in a case like this. His colleague in the protective gear took a bucket of water and splashed it on the fire. The fire fizzled out immediately, drawing snickers from the crowd. The announcer only lost his composure for a few seconds. “Don’t use water! It sometimes works, but most of the time it makes things worse!” he assured us.
Next, they were going to show us what we should do. They cleared the metal table of the wet pot and replaced it with an identical one, filled with fresh oil. Once again, they set it on fire, but this time, they put a fire blanket on it and left it there. “It’s important to wait for at least a minute before removing the blanket,” the announcer said. “You have to make sure the fire is out.” Together, we waited for what seemed a lot longer than a minute. When they finally removed the blanket, the flames immediately roared back higher than they had ever been.
The crowd were all-out laughing by then. The announcer made a feeble attempt to explain that this was highly unusual, but we had started dispersing.
I often remember this when I watch a live demo go wrong. Which is most of the time, because doing a live demo means playing with fire.
Nehaveigur 