Unexplained death by fire in London

Courtesy of the Daily Grail, here's a report of a man apparently catching fire as he walked along a street in London. He later died in hospital. No obvious reason was found for the fire:
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/m...20161.html

[Pollux]

Yeah, I like Joe Nickell try to explain that away as an “wick effect” .

I remember reading about this many years ago (late 70s?). Spontaneous human combustion, I think it was called, I'm not aware of having heard anything similar until now.

I remember reading about this many years ago (late 70s?). Spontaneous human combustion, I think it was called, I'm not aware of having heard anything similar until now.

Yes, it has quite a long history. Dickens used it to kill off a character in Bleak House. (I'm not sure whether that was a more or less convincing way of killing a villain than getting a house to collapse on him suddenly.)

Yeah, I like Joe Nickell try to explain that away as an “wick effect” .

Here's a rather fuller report in the Daily Telegraph: 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/...afflement/

A former Home Office pathologist is quoted. He refers to the "wick effect" but seems to acknowledge that it can't be the explanation in this case. (If I understand correctly the idea of the "wick effect" is that the fat in the body burns like a candle, with the victim's clothing acting as an external wick.)

Reading between the lines, the victim here may have been a heavy drinker, which - as the article says - is commonly associated with such cases.

The article also refers to a recent open-air case in Germany. Here's a report of that one:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...21941.html
And here's a sceptical commentary by Sharon Hill, suggesting that a conventional explanation would probably be found in the German case:
http://doubtfulnews.com/2015/11/media-li...t-so-fast/
But I can't see any later reports of that case, and it's not even clear whether or not the victim survived.

Reading between the lines, the victim here may have been a heavy drinker, which - as the article says - is commonly associated with such cases.

IIRC, the Dickens character in Bleak House was an alcoholic too. I remember he was played by Jonny Vegas in the BBC production.

Ahh, yes, my memory serves me well in this case:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/f...house-plot

Not surprisingly, Dickens has come in for plenty of stick for this incendiary moment. A contemporary critic, GH Lewes, quickly declared that "according to all known chemical and physiological laws, spontaneous combustion is an impossibility."

That such criticism stung is shown by the way Dickens hit back – at length, in a preface to the novel:

"The possibility of what is called spontaneous combustion has been denied since the death of Mr. Krook … I have no need to observe that I do not wilfully or negligently mislead my readers and that before I wrote that description I took pains to investigate the subject."

He goes on to list notable cases before adding: "I do not think it necessary to add to these notable facts … contenting myself with observing that I shall not abandon the facts until there shall have been a considerable spontaneous combustion of the testimony on which human occurrences are usually received."

[Pollux]

Here's a rather fuller report in the Daily Telegraph: 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/...afflement/

A former Home Office pathologist is quoted. He refers to the "wick effect" but seems to acknowledge that it can't be the explanation in this case. (If I understand correctly the idea of the "wick effect" is that the fat in the body burns like a candle, with the victim's clothing acting as an external wick.)

Reading between the lines, the victim here may have been a heavy drinker, which - as the article says - is commonly associated with such cases.

The article also refers to a recent open-air case in Germany. Here's a report of that one:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...21941.html
And here's a sceptical commentary by Sharon Hill, suggesting that a conventional explanation would probably be found in the German case:
http://doubtfulnews.com/2015/11/media-li...t-so-fast/
But I can't see any later reports of that case, and it's not even clear whether or not the victim survived.

Yeah, but how much hard liquor does one have to drink to spontaneously combust while walking down the street?

There's an interesting discussion of this case on Garth Haslam's Anomalies site:
http://anomalyinfo.com/Stories/2017-sept...iery-death

He points out that (contrary to some sensationalist press reports) no one actually saw the fire start, and therefore thinks it's likely that the man's clothes somehow caught fire, rather than that this was a case of spontaneous human combustion.

There is a theory that someone in a metabolic state of ketosis might produce enough acetone to become flammable.

https://gizmodo.com/what-causes-spontane...1486311596

Acetone is characterized by Prof. Ford as "one flammable constituent in the body that can greatly increase in concentration," and this happens when a body is in a state of ketosis. Potential causes of ketosis include certain diets, diabetes, teething and even alcoholism. Regardless of its source, acetone is highly flammable.

In his experiment, Prof. Ford

Marinated pork tissue in acetone [then used it] to make scale models of humans, which we clothed and set alight. They burned to ash within half an hour

Ford concluded that "for the first time a feasible cause of human combustion has been experimentally demonstrated."