[Fire disaster due to deflagration of a propane gas-air mixture]. / Folgenschwerer Brand durch Entzündung eines Propangas-Luft-Gemisches.

On 26 Nov 2012, a serious fire occurred at Neustadt/Black Forest in which 14 persons in a sheltered workshop died and 10 other individuals were injured. The fire was caused by the unbridled escape of propane gas due to accidental disconnection of the screw fixing between a gas bottle and a catalytic heater. Deflagration of the propane gas-air mixture set the workshop facilities on fire. In spite of partly extensive burns the fatally injured victims could be rapidly identified. The results of the fire investigations at the scene and the autopsy findings are presented. Carboxyhemoglobin concentrations ranged between 8 and 56 % and signs of fire fume inhalation were present in all cases. Three victims had eardrum ruptures due to the sudden increase in air pressure during the deflagration.

[Death in a relaxation tank]. / Tod im Entspannungstank.

Complete relaxation can be achieved by floating in a darkened, sound-proof relaxation tank filled with salinated water kept at body temperature. Under these conditions, meditation exercises up to self-hypnosis may lead to deep relaxation with physical and mental revitalization. A user manipulated his tank, presumably to completely cut off all optical and acoustic stimuli and accidentally also covered the ventilation hole. The man was found dead in his relaxation tank. The findings suggested lack of oxygen as the cause of death.

[Reconstruction of a fire homicide after pouring denatured alcohol on the victim]. / Rekonstruktion eines Brandmordes nach Ubergiessen mit Spiritus.

A 48-year-old man died from extensive burns suffered especially on the upper part of the body during a dispute with his ex-wife, who had poured spirit or a spirit-water mixture over him. For initially unknown reasons, the man's clothing caught fire. Whereas the public prosecutor assumed that the woman had intentionally poured a larger amount of spirit over her ex-husband before setting fire to him, the defendant first claimed to have poured the rest of a water-spirit mixture left over from cleaning the windows over the man and that his clothing caught fire on lighting a cigarette. To clarify the course of events, fire tests with spirit in various dilutions were conducted, which showed that even with undiluted spirit a direct contact with the flame of at least 1 second is necessary to start a fire. There is no deflagration, if spirit is used as a fire accelerant. In the trial, the defendant made a confession and admitted to have poured a mixture of 75% spirit and 25% water over her ex-husband and set fire to his right sleeve with the intention to kill him.

[Unusual findings in a death caused by a car fire]. / Ungewöhnliche Befunde bei einem Todesfall durch Fahrzeugbrand.

Witnesses detected a burning car in the parking lot next to a discotheque in the early morning hours. After the fire had been extinguished, the charred body of the 23-year-old car owner was found in the driver's seat. The young man had been a guest of the discotheque the previous night and consumed plenty of alcoholic drinks. The traces left by the fire on the car suggested that the fire had started in the passenger compartment. At autopsy, greyish-brown discoloration and induration of the mucosa of the respiratory tract were found in addition to massive aspiration of soot and signs of soot swallowing. The macroscopic and histological findings pointed to a chemical burn of the airways probably caused by chlorine gases developing when the covering of the passenger compartment was burning. Chemical burns due to inhalation, aspiration and swallowing of soot are all signs of vitality, so that a smoldering fire must have gone on for a while inside the car with the windows closed. The most probable cause of the fire is that clothing or textile material in the car was set on fire by a burning cigarette.