Woman using oxygen lights up, dies in flames

After hearing the smoke detector go off on Thursday, a Tempe man got out of the shower and found his wife engulfed in flames on their living room couch.

The 64-year-old woman, who died from her injuries, had lit a cigarette while using an oxygen tank to help her breathe, said Tempe fire inspector Phil Rohe.

Her 73-year-old husband extinguished the flames and called paramedics to the house in the 300 block of West La Jolla Drive, but the woman could not be revived, Rohe said.

The couple’s names were not released by officials. The husband and a fire captain were treated at a nearby hospital for smoke inhalation, Rohe said.

“It was a bad scene, one of the worst I’ve seen,” said Rohe.

It was a tragic lesson, he said, on the dangers of an open flame around oxygen.