While we think that our home is our safe haven, in reality, it's probably more dangerous than we realize.
Obvious things like gas-burning stoves and chemical cleaning products aside, there's plenty of questionable stuff lying around that can inflict serious damage on us.
Recently, Reddit user Cool_Kid_Lit_Fam_Sam asked other people on the platform to list these potentially life-threatening household objects and that kickstarted a viral online discussion that has reached 4,400 comments and the number is still growing.
So we compiled some of the most popular replies and present them for your judgment—continue scrolling and upvote the ones you think we need to handle with great caution.
#1
Oven cleaner. Had a friend of the family use it on a warm oven and breathed it in. Messed up her lungs and died in hospital.
Image credits: queenofthemeeps
#2
my mom used to boil a pot of bleach mixed with ammonia every saturday after cleaning. She said it was to “make the house smell clean” surprised im still alive
Image credits: Icecreamkillax
#3
Not sure if this is entirely related but i feel like it’s surprising that most people don’t know that you can’t put out a grease fire with water
Image credits: themountainlotus
#4
My wife's favorite pans.See you with a metal utensil anywhere near it, and she will kill you.
Image credits: DWBKC
#5
Doesn't exactly kill but can f**k your hand up for life so remember kids:A falling knife has no handle.
Image credits: Corvus_Manufaktura
#6
Bleach and other cleaners accidentally mixed together.
Image credits: Luder09
#7
Candles. Just because they're trendy and smell nice, doesn't mean they're not still a naked flame that can cause a housefire that can kill you in your sleep.
Image credits: NeverCadburys
#8
I have an important story!!When my dad was a kid, one of his good friends died by inhaling Pam cooking spray. The boy was a good, smart kid and just thought inhaling Pam would get you a little high, like sniffing a Sharpie or whatever. But Pam coats your lungs and very quickly suffocates you if you breathe it in. He had no idea how dangerous it was and he was dead in minutes. It was absolutely devastating for everyone who knew him.
TLDR; never ever inhale Pam and be very careful leaving it around kids! Make sure your kids are aware that it is deadly!
Image credits: greenoctopusink
#9
Wet floors, usually bathrooms. Anything that can make hitting your head easier can kill.Also, rotten potatoes exhale a gas that can be bad if you are in a closed room with a fairly large amount of them. It can kill within seconds.
Brew did a video about it on YouTube.
Image credits: Flowy_Aerie_77
#10
I used a mold removing product in my shower. Noticed a wierd unpleasant smell and didn't feel well. Checked whats in the product and quickly realised I almost killed myself.Moral of the story. Don't pee in the shower or make sure you know your chemicals and how they can react with other chemicals... Or p**s.
Image credits: SnarkoCockedYourWife
#11
The two most common types of accidental death in the home are falls in bathtubs and from ladders.
Image credits: Leftrightthere
#12
Pressure washers. The jet immediately penetrates the skin, injecting whatever's inside the washer or lining the washer into the blood stream. Even new, first time use cases can cause severe damage to the body. Do NOT play with pressure washers.
Image credits: anon
#13
Unsecured free-standing shelves are pretty dangerous, ESPECIALLY for kids who might try to climb on them.
Image credits: MedChemist464
#14
A peanutThe number of idiots who think it is so cool to catch peanuts in their mouth. The risk of it sailing into your lungs is far higher than you think.
Image credits: Novel-Structure-2359
#15
Cold and flu products/pain killers containing paracetamol . You’re suffering. You taken paracetamol, then lemsip, then more paracetamol, then more lemsip etc, before you know it you’ve had 8g of paracetamol. Your liver starts to fail.Read medicine labels. Don’t mix paracetamol products.
Image credits: VixenRoss
#16
Because it hasn’t been said here yet … F*****G STAIRSI’ve fallen down stairs at my work , banged my head and woke up in the hospital…. I wasn’t running down them , one f*****g loose floor board on the edge made me fall down 6-8 steps
Image credits: SexandPsychedelics
#17
A humidifierI thought I cleaned it well but apparently you need to drown it in bleach and or hot water to get all that bacteria out from giving you a severe lung infection
Image credits: TheRestIs_Confetti
#18
Car jack.If it fails and you didn't use jack stands, and you can't bench press a couple thousand pounds..... you gonna die.
Image credits: racerx21
#19
Magnets. Toddlers will put *anything* in their mouth. If they swallow one magnet, they’ll likely be fine. If they swallow two, they can have intestinal perforation. Without the words to communicate what’s wrong, it can easily be deadly#20
Dryer lint causes nearly 3,000 fires every year. Source: Karen Kilgariff’s dad.
Image credits: Quixidiocy
#21
Lift cords on blind windows. I've heard alot of stories of children getting tangled in them by the neck and dying. They have cordless blinds now so those are way better.
Image credits: AlwaysShip
#22
you should clean ur toaster bc if too many bread crumbs collect they could actually catch fire thru the heat of the toaster.
Image credits: joa_nh
#23
Microwaves. There's a reason they have a warning to not f**k with them even if they're not plugged in- you can still absolutely get fried if you open it up to mess with it. You're not safe just because it's unplugged.
Image credits: thewhitepearlreaper
#24
Eye drops, like the kind that removes redness. Slipped into a drink for example even a small amounts can cause cardiac issues or even death as the vasoconstricting properties can stifle blood flow to the heart#25
Apparently people can die from hair dryers catching fire. Because they sleep with them.Reading warning labels on household objects really gets me questioning how humans aren't all dead from idiocy.
Image credits: chut2906
#26
Food.Improperly handling just about any food can easily kill you or leave you wishing you were dead.
#27
A toilet. Saw a picture once of a woman who stood on a toilet to change her bathroom lightbulb, the toilet broke in half and when she fell the toilet cut her back wide open and she bled out. You could see everything inside of her, brutal.
Image credits: BoomHazard
#28
Cheap extension cords and power strips, especially ones without built in fail-safes that trip them if they are overloaded. The number of people who I see using those cheap, brown, dollar store extension cords, loading up every single available outlet, and leaving them plugged in 24/7 for years on end, makes me cringe.#29
Gas oven, we have cheapo oven where the stove top burner controls aren't the ones you have to push in to release and adjust, the amount of times I have smelled the gas because someone brushed against the damn oven and slightly opened a valve on one of the burners...I'm just glad I have the doors open most of the time.Don't know if it counts but gas fireplace heaters are dangerous if they are not properly checked by a qualified maintenance tech, or in the case of my high school friend the gas appliance engineer took a bribe from the landlord's son, and my friend died from carbon monoxide poisoning as a result, arseholes got suspended sentences but ten year probation.
#30
Using compressed air cans near a stove.
Image credits: Im_Not_A_Human_4
#31
An air compressor not maintained can explode.#32
Too much of certain spices. Some spices contain small amounts of exotic substances, that when consumed too much of, can easily cause organ failure.
Image credits: Grace_Dirig_body
#33
Garage door opener - specifically the springs. Those springs have a crapload of tension in them and if you mess with them they can mess you up. I had a contractor working at the house and he set up his work area in the garage. While he was working, one of the springs just broke on its own. He was okay, but he said it was so loud he thought a car had crashed into the garage.#34
Lithium batteries, idk if this is a normal household object but it burnt my whole 3200 sq ft house in 30 mins
Image credits: no-one-p
#35
My brother's father in law died falling off a ladder. He wasn’t even high up, just fell badly. His wife (a nurse) tried CPR, but he didn’t make it. He had no other health problems#36
Every electrical appliance and outlet because it only takes about 10ma of current to start causing a heart to stop beating. And most homes have at least 100 amp main breakers and I know my place has a 200 amp main, they won't pop when it kills you either.Tons of the stuff in our homes has some sort of plastic in it. They get hot and can give off fumes that will at the very least make us sick and may even start to smoke but not be hot enough to cause the smoke to rise to set off a smoke detector.
Image credits: nightshade00013
#37
Cutting boards. Cross contaminations a b***h if you have a bad immune system#38
Dinner plate.....let me explain.Went to sleep watching TV on the couch?
Woke up and decided to go to bed but tripped over the vacuum cleaner and fell face forward onto the corner of the coffee table.
I had left my plate from dinner there. Plate broke in half as I fell and sliced me open from lower right rib the top of left pelvis.
60km ambulance ride, hospital and surgery to put me back together.
#39
Due to certifications like UL, and GFCI outlets in kitchens and bathrooms, there is way more safety built into things than decades ago. Certain woodworking tools are the first to come to mind, but most people realize they are dangerous. Using a table saw wrong and having it launch a board at your face? Or pulling yourself down onto it could easily cause fatal injuries if someone isn’t around to offer quick medical assistance. Lathes, mills, or drill presses can be super dangerous if they snag any loose clothing or hair and pull you in. It seems the people who are least aware of the danger are people who are fairly new to using them so they know the basics but end up overconfident and assume they know everything they need to know.#40
Inserting a copper penny into a screw-in fuse box circuit as a "temporary measure" until replacement fuses can be obtained.#41
People who are left handed using everyday items that were designed to be used with your right hand#42
A garbage disposal sink, seriously if you have long hair and it gets caught in it your in trouble
Image credits: AffectionateBus9086
#43
Smoke detectors, if you forget to change the battery or you don’t check if your smoke detector is still working, undetected smoke at night when you are sleeping could kill you.#44
Cupboard door. One fast wrong turn and a lucky corner shot to the temple and you’re done.#45
Pressure cooker
Image credits: pfghost
#46
The breaker box is about as dangerous as can be by design code changes.#47
I remember all the boilers being super dangerous when I was younger. I can't really remember why because they where being fazed out in the UK when I was growing up but it was either carbon monoxide or they could blow up#48
A stovetop espresso maker.The method of operation is the water in the bottom chamber boils, and the steam pressure pushes up the hot water through the coffee grounds into the upper pot.
There is only one safety on these things, and it's the valve on the water tank. If the water is filled too high so it covers the valve, you've made a pipe bomb. If the coffee is ground too fine or tamped and the safety valve is blocked it WILL explode and send boiling coffee and water everywhere.
Luckily this is very easily avoidable. Never fill the water over the safety valve, and never tamp the coffee in the basket.
#49
Acetaminophen (Tylenol).OD’ing on it only takes about twice the amount on the box’s directions, which is very low compared to other common medications. Its negative effects are kidney failure, which starts with kidney pains, but quite quickly leads to a painful death.
It is scarily common. People first take Tylenol for a good reason but they take too much, so they start feeling kidney pain, so they take more Tylenol for that kidney pain, because they think it’s harmless and should help to feel good. By the time it gets bad enough that they go to the ER, they’re already dead, their body just doesn’t know it yet.
Always follow medication directions, particularly on Tylenol.
#50
An outlet and a fork.#51
Used a grinder once. Never again. That thing constantly wanted to kill me due to the lopsided torque.#52
Red pepper flakes , if you inhale them on accident while taking a bite of food , your throat will close.from Bored Panda https://bit.ly/3oUsahN
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