"If you use alcohol as a fuel, please remember that it is much more flammable than wood. Never add alcohol (or any liquid fuel) to a burning fire, or it will react much [like] lighter fluid"
This should be at the beginning of the article, rather than the end. People have suffered severe burns on multiple occasions from doing the "rainbow fire experiment" and adding alcohol directly to the flame.
i add alcohol directly to flame all the time, and even burn it on my skin. there are real risks to be careful of, but i think you are exaggerating them
alcohol is great for this kind of thing for several reasons:
- you can extinguish a spill with water
- its low boiling point protects your skin and other materials from high heat, but only when they are wet with it
- you can mix a little water into it to enhance this surface-protecting effect
- unlike many organic solvents, its toxicity is quite low (ethanol and isopropanol, not methanol)
- it produces very little carbon monoxide or soot
that said, it can still spread fire quite far quite fast, and a house fire can go from the size of a small campfire to deadly flashover in under a minute, so be very careful
This should be at the beginning of the article, rather than the end. People have suffered severe burns on multiple occasions from doing the "rainbow fire experiment" and adding alcohol directly to the flame.