Hereford woman, Sarah Williams, thanks fellow motorist for rescue as fire starts in car boot (From Hereford Times)

Hereford woman, Sarah Williams, thanks fellow motorist for rescue as fire starts in car boot

7:00am Friday 16th October 2009

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A Hereford woman has thanked a fellow motorist for helping put out a fire in the boot of her car – caused by her laptop battery.

Sarah Williams, aged 32, was driving in her Vauxhall Zafira with her eight-year-old daughter Meg and three-year-old son Ben when she stopped at the traffic lights near the Folly Lane and Ledbury Road junction.

“I heard a loud bang in the boot of the car, like the sound you hear when tyres pop,” said Mrs Williams, who had just dropped off her son Steven at Hereford Sixth Form College.

“I saw the flames behind Meg, so I immediately got the kids out of the car. Luckily, a man in the van behind heard the bang as well and got out of his car.

“He must have dragged the laptop out with some wood, as the wood was singed.

“He stamped it out with his foot.

“If it wasn’t for him then it could have been a lot worse.”

Mrs Williams said that neither she nor her children were burned, but Meg’s jumper was blackened and the back seat singed.

Ray Wilson, network support engineer for E-Desk, a computer repair firm in Burghill, said that it is very rare for laptop batteries to catch fire, but it is not unheard of.

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