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IKEA investigates after bowl sets man's grapes on fire

Swedish furniture giant IKEA is to investigate the designs of a stainless steel bowl after a man ...
Newstalk
Newstalk

16.43 21 Jun 2017


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IKEA investigates after bowl s...

IKEA investigates after bowl sets man's grapes on fire

Newstalk
Newstalk

16.43 21 Jun 2017


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Swedish furniture giant IKEA is to investigate the designs of a stainless steel bowl after a man reported that the grapes it was storing caught on fire when the sun’s rays were reflected off its surface.

Speaking to Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, Richard Walter said he was eating grapes out of his IKEA ‘Blanda Blank’ metal bowl during the ongoing heatwave taking place all across Europe. Alerted to the smell of burning, he first assumed that the scent was coming from his neighbours’ barbeque.

But casting an eye into his fruit bowl, he realised his fruit had caught fire.

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“I saw it was burning in the grape bowl,” Walter said. “‘How is that possible?’ I thought. Then I saw there was one intense point where the sun hit the twigs, and that’s where it started.”

Walter believes the grapes were burned when the concave shape of the bowl focused the heat from the sunlight to one particular point.

To test his hypothesis, and to prove to his friends that his grapes had really caught fire, the Swede posted a video on Facebook, using a scrap of newspaper to prove he was telling the truth.

IKEA officials said they would investigate the bowl’s design and carry out their own tests.

“We take this information very seriously and will now investigate what happened,” spokesperson Emil Eriksson said.

Speaking to The Local, he added: "Product safety is always a top priority at Ikea and Ikea products are always tested to comply with applicable standards and legislations.

“In risk assessment, for the bowl Blanda it has been established that many different parameters would have to converge for the content of the bowl to overheat and that the risk for this to happen is very low.

“The round design of the bowl further contributes to a very low risk of spreading, in case of any overheated material in the bowl.”

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