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Oily rag self-combusts in anchor locker
Practical Boat Owner
|May 2025
Boat owners and crew are being reminded of the dangers of leaving oily rags on board following the spontaneous combustion of rags in a yacht’s anchor locker in Jersey.
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Jersey Harbour Authority’s Safety Bulletin 01 of 2025 warns of the incident involving a pleasure yacht in St Helier. The crew had cleaned the anchor locker using oil or white-spirit cleaning products. A small quantity of used rags coated in the cleaning product was stored in a plastic airtight box on a high shelf close to the underside of the foredeck. The rags smouldered and melted the lid of the box, likely due to the exothermic evaporation of self-extinguished and was only discovered after the event. It caused smoke damage to the inside of the anchor locker, which required minor repairs.
This story is from the May 2025 edition of Practical Boat Owner.
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