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Cars burn on top of large leaf piles in St. Louis neighborhood

Firefighters confirm what neighbors expected. The car was parked on top of very dry leaves, collected in big piles on the street. Heat from under the car caught the leaves on fire, and it spread quickly.
Car on fire. Photo credit Andy Joyce

People in one St. Louis neighborhood said a common fall problem has become a serious safety issue.

Tall piles of leaves led to at least two on one street to catch fire in recent days.

Jim and Janice Sheets said it only took a few minutes for their daughter’s car to burst into flames.

“Its scary first off all,” Jim said. “My daughter had her purse in the car, plus a lot of personal possessions. My one grandson had a book of Pokémon [card]s, probably 400 in there that are personal to him that went up in flames.”

Firefighters confirm what neighbors expected. The car was parked on top of very dry leaves, collected in big piles on the street. Heat from under the car caught the leaves on fire, and it spread quickly.

The St. Louis Fire Department even tweeted a warning about combustible leaf piles this weekend.

Trust us, leaves are combustible, and WILL burn. Parking a hot/running vehicle over them might lead to a higher insurance premium. #ThrowbackPost pic.twitter.com/MR9RWdu1Qr

— St. Louis Fire Dept (@STLFireDept) December 10, 2017

Neighbors say the problem is the ever-growing leaf piles, still uncollected by city workers.

“We use to have leaf pick up every 10 days. And its been a month since we had leaf pick up,” Sheets said.

Just last week, 5 On Your Side reported a change to the City of St. Louis leaf collection program — from once a week in some neighborhoods to now twice a month.

Commissioner of Streets, Kent Flake, said even when city workers are trying to remove leaves, they are often unable to reach them due to parked cars.

“We were probably doing, maybe at best 50 percent pick up because we were dodging cars all day," he said. "We were wasting a lot of time,” he said last week.

The Sheets live on Longfellow Boulevard, where they say leaf pick up is even less frequent this year.

“We’ve had one pick up this season. Normally by now we’d have three to five and were getting one more, and that’s it,” Jim said.

“It’s wrong,” Janice added. “I think you have to look at the area by the number of trees… I think when you have big, stately oak trees like we have here that drop a gob of leaves, you’ve got to pick up more often.”

The fire outside the Sheets’ home was the second one on the street in recent days. They said they are grateful their children and grandchildren and the family pets were all inside when the fire started.

“We’re not asking for special favors, were asking for the leaves to be picked up,” Janice said. “It’s a safety measure. So far nothings been lost but stuff. Cars and possessions. But it could have been a lot worse.”

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