Characteristics of fire victims in different sorts of fires

We studied retrospectively 286 cases of fire deaths from a 10 year period. The victims were classified according to the type of fire. Among the victims of smouldering fire, 80% had lethal HbCO saturations, whereas only 30% had such saturations when an accelerant had been used. The third group consisted of victims of fires in which the type of fire was, for various reasons, undetermined. HbCO saturations were not influenced by sex, age, concomitant disease or blood alcohol concentration. In eight cases neither respiratory soot nor HbCO was detected in spite of evidence that the deceased was alive as the fire broke out. The material included nine cases of homicide and 22 cases of suicide.