Why we need to get better at teaching fire safety

Fire safety skills can feel so innate that we might have been born with them. So many aspects of fire safety can feel like common sense: the risks of chip pan fires, not draping clothes over heaters, not leaving your straighteners on the bed. The longer we go without experiencing a fire, the more that sense of imperviousness reinforces itself.

But is this feeling of safety an illusion, and are the parameters for fire safety changing? In a world where temperatures are rising, misinformation is flourishing, and electronics pose a growing fire risk, are we getting complacent about fire safety—and is a serious change to the way we discuss and enforce it needed to avoid unnecessary deaths?

A changing climate

Countries like the UK aren’t traditionally seen as hotbeds for wildfires, or for large-scale heat-related incidents. However, climate change is steadily shifting that perception. The UK recorded its hottest-ever temperature in 2022, exceeding 40°C for the first time. By late April 2025, the UK had already exceeded the annual record for areas burned by wildfires, and the start of May proved to be the hottest in recorded history.

With hotter, drier springs becoming more common—let alone summers—so too are the conditions that allow fires to spread rapidly. Wildfires in counties like Yorkshire, Dorset, and Surrey that might once have been unthinkable are now becoming annual events, causing evacuations, destroying property, and increasing pressure on already-stretched emergency services.

This environmental change doesn’t only increase the likelihood of large-scale fires; it also raises the everyday risks in homes and businesses. Prolonged periods of heat can overwork electrical systems, dry out materials, and encourage people to use makeshift cooling solutions, like placing often-ancient electrical fans dangerously close to flammable objects. Combine this with stronger sun exposure on buildings not designed for extreme heat, and the UK is beginning to face fire risks previously associated with Mediterranean climates.

The illusion of safety

Another factor dulling our collective awareness of fire safety is the belief that technology has essentially “solved” the issue of fire safety, or is on the cusp of doing so. Smart smoke detectors, AI-powered fire monitoring systems, and automated extinguishing solutions promise round-the-clock protection, a promise that some people are eagerly buying into. While these innovations have the capacity to save lives and improve response times, they also risk creating a false sense of security.

There’s a psychological danger in believing that a gadget will always detect a fire risk before it becomes serious. This mindset can lead to fundamentally unsafe behaviour—leaving appliances plugged in, overloading sockets, or assuming that a smart device will compensate for your own poor decision-making. Worse still, as more people rent rather than own their homes, especially in urban areas, many may be unaware of what technology is actually installed, or assume their landlords have taken care of safety measures. This insidious shift in behaviour means that fire prevention increasingly feels like someone else’s responsibility—until it’s too late.

Rethinking fire safety education

All these developments—rising temperatures, dangerous misinformation, substandard products, and over-reliance on technology—point to a simple but urgent truth: we need to rethink how we teach fire safety. Current educational efforts, where they exist, are often aimed at children, or delivered only at specific life stages. But like any form of safety, fire safety isn’t something we should learn once and forget. It needs to be repeated and reiterated, forming an ongoing part of public education for all ages, and one that melds digital literacy with better environmental awareness.

This might mean updating school curricula to improve digital safety, and discuss the impact of environmental factors on fire safety. It might also mean providing adults with refresher courses tailored to modern risks, or empowering community fire services to reach out to their communities, and provide these resources for them. It should also mean holding online marketplaces accountable for the safety of the products they sell, and social media platforms accountable for the misinformation they too often foster.

Beyond this, it means increasing our vigilance around fires, and protective measures against them. Where behaviour worsens, it may be necessary to ramp up protection of both public and private spaces. Fire walls, barriers, curtains, and other passive fire protection technologies offer a form of both first and last resort protection that is effective regardless of people’s individual behaviour: shielding escape routes, slowing the spread of fire, and supporting the efforts of firefighters and other emergency personnel in the event of a fire emergency.

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Fire safety has always been contingent on individuals understanding risk as much as the systems we put in place. The perception that fire safety is a “solved issue” is dangerous, and not something we can allow to fester. Climate change is making fires more likely, and misinformation is spreading faster than ever. No amount of AI or automation can fix these issues, or replace human judgement when it comes to preventing tragedy.

Protecting lives and property in this new era may mean we need to face the reality that our traditional ideas of fire risk are outdated. This isn’t an issue we can afford to be complacent on, or one we should dither over. Fire safety education needs to adapt and evolve to meet these new obstacles—before the next generation forgets what we once learned the hard way.