The film was ambitious both as science and as reporting, for it set out to debunk once and for all the centuries-old belief that, under some mysterious circumstances, humans can catch fire and be almost entirely consumed, even in the security of their own homes.
Most impressive of all, the film set out to debunk the idea not merely with argument and theories, but with an actual experimental demonstration on camera in which the carcass of a pig was substituted for that of a human body.
The film's narrator, Samuel West, told viewers that, 'This film has brought together for the first time the world's top fire experts and follows their quest to solve the mystery of Spontaneous Human Combustion.'
The film's method was persuasive. First it showed experienced, intelligent and sincere professionals -- a fire chief and a police officer -- swearing that the bodies they found could only be cases of Spontaneous Human Combustion.
Later, though, evidence was produced of possible sources of flame, in one case a book-match, in another a small candle, and the professionals were compelled to admit they could have been mistaken. Viewers saw for themselves how even the experts can be misled, and how easy it is to imagine extraordinary or paranormal causes for what are really quite mundane events.
Home Office Pathologist professor Mike Green, of Southampton University, made it clear that he did not believe in spontaneous human combustion. 'The way the body burns -- the so-called wick effect,' he said, 'seems to me and to my colleagues to be the most scientifically credible hypothesis.'
Then the film makers, producer Jan Klimkowski and director Stephen Leslie, enlarged on this scientific explanation.
'Forensic scientists . . .' they told viewers, '. . . are convinced that, like other fires, these fires are most commonly started by a careless match or cigarette and they believe there is a simple explanation of how this can reduce the body to ash.'
'The scientific explanation -- the 'wick effect' -- proposes that in certain rare circumstances the human being can burn like a candle.'
The explanation advanced by the film makers was that a clothed human body is like an inside-out candle where the fat, or fuel source, is inside and the wick is outside. Once burning begins, the melted fat seeps into the clothing and burns like a wick, slowly over a period of many hours.
Dr John DeHaan of the California Criminalistics Institute demonstrated this theory by burning the body of a pig wrapped in a blanket to simulate a clothed human being, using about a litre of petrol as an initial accelerant.
The film makers concluded emphatically, 'The scientists have clearly demonstrated how the classic features of spontaneous human combustion can occur through normal processes.'
Importantly, the 'wick effect' explanation proposed in the film necessarily entails three key features:-
- It is a slow, gradual process taking many hours, typically 5 to 10 hours or more. In the DeHaan experiment, the pig carcass was still not fully consumed after 7 hours.
- There is always a source of combustion -- matches, cigarette, candle, gas fire, coal fire etc, and some initial accelerant -- perfume, alcohol, or some other spirit.
- Because it is a long slow process involving the melting of body fat, the victim must necessarily be killed.
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Why is this an example of pseudoscience?
Almost incredibly, the reporters who made the film and the scientists who took part in it, chose to ignore completely the fact that there are a number of recent, well-documented cases of people who have experienced or witnessed spontaneous human combustion at first hand and who lived to tell what happened. And the first-hand experience of these witnesses completely contradicts the key features of the 'scientific explanation' in every detail.
First, there is the case of Fire Brigade Commander John Stacey, called to a house fire in Lambeth in 1967, who discovered Robert Bailey in the early stages of combustion and burning from inside his abdomen 'like a blow torch' in a derelict house where gas and electricity had been turned off and where there were no other sources of ignition. [Click here to read details of this and other cases and a discussion of their significance.]
Second, there is the 1982 case of 62-year old Jean Saffin who burst into flames while sitting at the table of her kitchen in Edmonton, London, in the presence of her father and her brother-in-law, Donald Carroll, who was called to the room. Ms Saffin burned in front of them and died later in hospital. Despite the eyewitness evidence given at the inquest on her death, the coroner, Dr. J. Burton, said 'I sympathise with you but I cannot put down SHC because there is no such thing. I will have to put down misadventure or open verdict.'
Third, there is the 1998 case of Agnes Phillips who burst into flames while sitting in her daughter's parked car in a suburb of Sydney, Australia, while on a shopping trip with her daughter. Mrs. Phillips burned in front of her daughter and a passer-by, Bradley Silva, who beat out the flames, and died a week later in hospital. The New South Wales Fire Inspector told the inquest that at the time she caught fire, the car engine was not running; there was no trace of liquid accelerants and no faulty wiring. Neither Mrs Phillips nor her daughter were smokers and the maximum temperature on the day of the fire was 16º C.
Other well documented eyewitness cases include:-
Helen Conway
Olga Stephens
Jeanna Winchester
Click Here to read details of many similar well-documented eyewitness cases.
But how could the film makers be expected to know about cases such as these?
The QED team expressed their thanks at the end of the film to Larry Arnold. Arnold heads an organisation called ParaScience International and has been collecting cases of possible spontaneous human combustion for over twenty years. He is the author of the 1995 book on the subject entitled Ablaze! which contains details of more than 400 cases including numerous well-documented survivor cases.
Even had they been overcome by group amnesia after looking through the voluminous files and books of Larry Arnold, the researchers could still have browsed the Internet, where they would have found the case of Agnes Phillips on the Fortean Times web site, or simply visited the public library and borrowed a copy of the 1982 Reader's Digest Mysteries of the Unexplained where further cases of SHC survival were reported. Or Colin Wilson's 1988 Encyclopaedia of unexplained mysteries, where again they would have found similar cases.
In other words, even the most superficial research by the film makers would have alerted them to the existence of living eye-witnesses whose testimony they could have sought, and who flatly contradict everything advanced in their conjectural theory.
The fact that they chose to ignore this contradictory evidence and to rely solely instead on the theories of scientific rationalists who set out to debunk what they perceive as just another piece of paranormal nonsense, shows that the film makers' minds were already made up before they started filming. They completely failed in their most elementary duty -- to check both sides of the story.
Possibly this was because they themselves were pursuing some misguided notions of defending 'scientific rationalism' against new age credulity.
Whatever the reason, the reality is that it was they, the film makers, who were the agents of pseudoscience in this case.
In my opinion, BBC TV and its QED team, if they wish to retain their deservedly high reputation for honesty, accuracy and impartiality, should publicly dissociate themselves from these film makers and their fundamentally flawed film, a film that has been passed off on a trusting public as scientifically credible and as representing the authoritative 'scientific' viewpoint.
To read details of the possible SHC cases referred to above and other eyewitness cases Click Here.
If the wick effect conjecture were true, there should be many non-fatal victims of the effect. I.e., persons who awoke or were rescued part-way through the event. The lesion through which the fat exited, as well as fat-saturated fabric around them would have been physical evidence, and the testimony of the victim and/or rescuer of a low-level, spread-out, smoky/smoldering flame would have been eyewitness evidence.
So where is that evidence?
The wick effect is consistent with most cases of SHC -- but that doesn't necessarily prove causation. And it's a bit implausible on its face, given that it would require an odd combination of circumstances to get it going. A burning cigarette will only burn a smoldering hole in typical clothing. It would be rare for this to create a lesion in the skin through which human fat could pour into the clothing (the wick). And it would be hard for a smoldering hole to heat human flesh hot enough to get the fat to liquefy. The proponent of the wick-effect theory had to soak part of the fabric with which he wrapped his demo-object (a pig carcass) in gasoline and then ignite it with a match. Perhaps, one time in 100, a smoldering cigarette might have done the trick without assistance. But that remains to be shown.