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VegasScotty's avatar
VegasScotty
Explorer
Oct 31, 2016

Fire came out of my water faucet in my camp trailer

Went camping last weekend, last time I used my 2010 KZ was in July, 3.5 months ago. After that trip I drained all the water, including hot water tank, and left the low point drain open.

On this trip I plugged into city water at a NV state park. I could hear it gurgling as it filled the hot water tank so I opened the hot water faucet to relieve some pressure. When I did this the water pushed out in spurts, which is about normal as the air is displaced from the hot water tank.

Ok, so now here is what's weird. I turned down the hot water faucet to allow less water/air pressure to escape and to keep the water from splashing out on the kitchen counter due to the pressure. At one point, after say less than a minute of having connected to city water, a gas (as in gaseous looking vapor) came out of the water faucet.

I laughed and presuming it was water vapor told my wife it looked like fog. She said it looked like gas and me being the smart ass grabbed a lighter and imagine my surprise when it caught on fire!

I stared at my wife who was big eyed and it instantly occurred to me that the flame had gone INSIDE the faucet and I quickly opened up the hot water faucet all the way and the sudden blast of water pushed a ball of fire about the size of a my thumb out of the end of the faucet.

No, I'm not making this up.

I've never heard of/seen anything like this. Any thoughts? If I hadn't turned up the water flow and pushed out the flame would it have gone into my hot water tank and exploded, killing me and my wife?

More details:
- Propane was turned off for 3 months.
- No smell, no odor when I lit the vapor.
- Later the hot water did not have any smell either.
- The low-point drain was open the whole 3 months since last use.
- The anode rod is perhaps 3/4 used up, it's about 1 year old.
- I flushed the tank 1 year ago when installing the anode rod

38 Replies

  • I have heard of poltergeists. This is the first time I heard of a trailergeist!
  • Why didn't I think of that?

    Sanitize and sterilize all at once by fire.
  • Next time get it on video. It would be a big hit on You Tube !!!




    On second thought, don't get it on video. People will freak out and before you know it campers will cost more money because they will need built in fire extinguisher on the water lines. Or, something stupid like that.
  • Some farm wells in our oil industry region have natural gas leaks.

    This article says hydrogen comes from the hot water tank anode reactions.
    http://waterheatertimer.org/pdf/Hydrogen-gas-WARNING.pdf
  • Did you leave the electric heating element on? The frying you heard may have been the burned out element producing hydrogen and oxygen by electrolysis.
  • That is not all that uncommon- if you Google "hydrogen buildup in water heater" you get a lot of hits.
  • Sounds to me that the camp water source has natural gas mixed with the water supply, We have such wells in my area of NW Ohio. I don't believe there is much odor with Nat. gas, propane has the odor added by supplier. Dave

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