Dangerous China-Made MK Lighters that Light Up Even When You Don’t

Disposable Lighters and Your Safety
The Chinese firm Zhuoye Lighter Company Ltd. Makes millions of cheap, disposable, and unsafe lighters that it distributes through a U.S. subsidiary. These defective lighters can leak butane, suddenly explode, and cause deadly fires. But it’s not violating any laws or regulatory standards by selling the dangerous lighters.

The U.S. CPSC (Consumer Products Safety Commission) declined in both 2001 and 2006 to mandate needed safety standards for disposable lighters. The only safety standard that a disposable lighter must meet is child-resistance. Otherwise, the CPSC restricts itself to issuing recalls on unsafe and defective lighters.

Other industrialized nations, including Canada and the European Union nations, do mandate safety standards. In this area, as in several other areas of safety, The U.S. lags behind other industrialized nations.

Some Interesting Statistics on Disposal Lighters

• About 1 BILLION of the devices are produced each year.
• Cheap imported disposable lighters account for more than 75% of the U.S. market.
• Chinese-made lighters make up almost 60% of the lighters imported into the U.S.
• CPSC studies found that fewer than 40% of disposable lighters conform to voluntary safety standards. (Manufacturers need not, and often do not, conform to voluntary standards.)
• The CPSC research found that China-made lighters had the lowest rate of conformance to voluntary safety standards at only about 30%.
• CPSC analysis of the problem found that unsafe disposable lighters caused more than 900 injuries each year and cost society $31 million dollars annually.

And the CPSC still declined to mandate safety standards for disposable lighters. One wonders how many people must be injured, how many people must die, and how much those injuries and fatalities must cost society before the CPSC takes action. And make no mistake: people do die from the dangerous, unsafe lighters. Learn what you can do if you’re injured by an unsafe lighter.

Death by Dangerous, Disposable Lighter
William B. Clemmer of Stephenville, TX dies after a Chinese-made MK disposable lighter exploded in his pocket and caused severe burns over half his body. Expert examination of the MK disposable lighter discovered that manufacturing and design defects could allow debris to collect on the globe seal. This would prevent the MK disposable light from completely sealing the lighter orifice. So even after a user has “closed” the lighter and put it away, gas could keep flowing and keep a miniscule flame burning. The flame might be too small for you to see it behind the windscreen, but it’s not too small to cause an explosion and deadly fire.

And manufacturing defects in the metering pad also could allow liquid butane to flow unevenly through the lighter orifice. So over time, the butane could pass through the orifice in liquid form rather than burning off as a gas. The liquid butane could then collect on your clothing. Body heat could cause the butane in the clothing to evaporate again in gas form. This expands its volume by about 60%.

The unextinguished tiny flame on the MK disposable light could then ignite the collected butane, exploding the lighter and catching you and your clothing on fire. This is what happened to William Clemmer. In addition, his MK disposable lighter contained an adjustable flame device that most major lighter manufacturers abandoned due to explosion hazards.

A Call to Action to the CPSC for Safety
William Clemmer’s brother Ricky said it best in an article on the Safety Research & Strategies site: “A cheap, disposable lighter killed my brother.” Ricky Clemmer calls on the CPSC to recall the dangerous MK disposable lighters and to set necessary minimum safety standards to save others from suffering such needless and completely preventable tragedies.