FORTEAN FIRES

Spontaneous fires spout from water pipes, furniture

The mysterious phenomenon of the spontaneous fires among the residents of Canneto, Italy, has come to a standstill. Experts of the State Rescue Services continue to carry out checks while awaiting special instruments from Milan in order to get more precise results.
Yesterday fires were breaking out in water pipes and between pieces of electrical wire which had been cut and were lying on the ground without being connected to any source of energy.
The electricty has been turned off in Canneto for several days but this did not stop the fires breaking out. Flames developed again and again without any plausible explanation in domestic appliances, intercoms, plugs, meters.

The UK Mirror newspaper reports: Over three weeks fridges, washing machines, cookers and furniture all began bursting into flames for no reason. Twelve houses were badly damaged by blazes in the quiet village. Last night Italian TV showed people fleeing in tears while fireman rushed to fight yet another spontaneous blaze.
"People are blaming evil spirits and I am being asked to get the priest to perform an exorcism," said Mayor Pedro Spinnato.

Devil in the detail of Sicily's mysterious village fires

"What is happening is what normally happens when the devil enters the lives of those who let him in," Father Gabriele Amorth said yesterday as scientists and officials confessed themselves unable to explain a string of fires and explosions which began in the middle of last month in the fishermen's quarter of a Sicilian village.
Gianfranco Allegra, of the Italian Centre for Electro-technical Experimentation, told the newspaper Corriere della Sera that he had watched as "an electrical wire lying on the floor that was not plugged in to the mains inexplicably caught fire". When he reported the incident to his superiors in Milan he was told to sober up.
What makes the incidents all the more puzzling is that the area has been without an electricity supply since January 4. On Monday the affair took a new turn when a chair burst into flames. Then a fire started in a water pipe.