The dryer sheet that almost burned my apartment down

I threw in a load of towels last Tuesday at my building's shared laundry room and didn't think twice about the leftover dryer sheet from the previous cycle. About 15 minutes into the dry cycle I smelled this weird burning plastic smell and saw smoke puffing out the vent. I yanked open the door and that old dryer sheet had melted onto the heating element and was smoldering like crazy. I grabbed the fire extinguisher from the wall and just stood there ready to blast it but the smoke stopped after I opened the door wide. The super had to come down and replace the whole heating element because that melted plastic crusted on there so bad. Has anyone else dealt with a dryer sheet catching fire like that or am I just the unluckiest person in Brooklyn?

2 comments

2 Comments

kim_johnson511mo ago

Last month I left an old lint trap sitting on top of the dryer and walked away for five minutes. Came back to find it had warped into this sad little plastic puddle that looked exactly like a melted cheese slice. The smell was so bad my neighbor two floors up knocked on my door asking if I was trying to cook a science experiment. I tried to scrape it off with a butter knife and just made it worse. Ended up having to buy the building a whole new dryer because the plastic fused into the vent system like cement. Your story makes me feel way less dumb about that actually.

jamesf411mo ago

You know, I had a similar thing happen with a toaster oven about five years ago. I left a pizza slice in there too long and the cheese melted onto the heating coil, then hardened into this black crusty ring that smelled like burnt socks. When I tried to chip it off with a screwdriver, I accidentally nicked the coil and the whole thing started sparking. My wife walked in and asked if I was trying to rebuild the toaster oven from scratch. I ended up just tossing it in the dumpster and buying a new one from a thrift store for eight bucks. The new one works fine, but every time I use it I smell that same awful burnt cheese smell for a second and it makes me cringe.