Yes, closing doors can help slow fire from spreading and limit damage

VALRICO, Fla. — Tammy Olis couldn’t believe it when she first saw it for herself.

The house in Valrico she and her husband own, which they’d been renting to a young family, had caught on fire.

Luckily nobody was home at the time. The home sustained significant water damage but the smoke and fire itself was mostly contained to one room.

Hillsborough County Fire Rescue posted photos of Olis’ home to its Facebook page on April 10 with the message: “Close before you doze!”

“All doors were closed,” the Facebook post reads. “The fire stayed in the bedroom where it started.”

The photos show smoke damage to the hallway and outside of the door to the nursery which was directly across the hall from the fire. “Because the doors were closed,” the post said, “that room (the nursery) was unaffected.”

THE QUESTION

Can a closed door really help limit the spread of fire and smoke?

THE SOURCES

• U.S. Fire Administration
• Fire Safety Research Institute
• National Fire Protection Association
• Dr. James Milke, chair of the Department for Fire Protection Engineering at the University of Maryland
• Ready.gov, a U.S. government public service campaign aimed at giving people the tools for emergency preparedness

THE ANSWER

Yes, closing doors really can help limit the spread of fire and smoke.

WHAT WE FOUND

Tammy Olis admitted she’d heard it before, but always thought it was a myth that closed doors could limit a fire’s spread.

Now she believes it.

"To see the difference in the baby's room," she said. "Hopefully we've learned the lesson so nobody else will have to learn the hard way."

Fires need oxygen to burn, and closing doors helps keep oxygen contained in the room and away from the fire, say the U.S. Fire Administration and the Fire Safety Research Institute. Fires also need fuel, meaning anything like bedding or furniture can act as propellant for flames.

Closed doors also create a barrier between the fire and anyone still inside the structure, allowing crucial time to block smoke from entering the room through cracks and vents, and signal for help, says Dr. James Milke, chair of the Department for Fire Protection Engineering at the University of Maryland.

Milke told VERIFY that around 80 percent of house fire deaths in the past few decades have been because of smoke inhalation rather than burns. In addition to chemical and carbon monoxide exposure, smoke can also block visibility for those trying to flee.

“Smoke obscures visibility because you can't see through it,” Milke said. “So now, people are having to regroup along a stairway or a corner to try and find their way out, and that's going to impair their movement speed, which is going to reduce how fast they can walk and may create trip hazards and prolong their exposure to toxins.”

Milke said it’s unclear just how much time a closed door gives trapped residents in comparison to one that’s open because fires start and spread for a variety of reasons that vary case-by-case. The quality of the door can also play a role; basic, inexpensive wooden doors can offer protection, but sturdier builds can potentially give a person slightly more time depending on the materials used. Regardless, Milke says, “any door closed is better than a fire door that's open.”

The U.S. Fire Administration and Ready.gov, which provide emergency preparedness resources, agree: If you are stuck in a fire, feel the doorknobs and the door. If it’s hot, or if you see smoke coming around the door, leave it shut and use a secondary exit, like a window or stairwell. 

On its Escape Planning Tips site, the National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) says if you do have to crawl through smoke, get low and limit as much of your oxygen intake as possible.

Other practical tips include making a home escape plan, practicing it with those in your household and making sure your smoke alarm batteries are up to date. The NFPA advises you to check them every month. Alarms should be interconnected, meaning if one goes off, they all go off.

VERIFY’s Kyley Schultz and Mauricio Chamberlin contributed to this report