Action sheet — Before the fire
Putting out your cigarette properly: the simple step that prevents a fire
A cigarette butt remains red-hot for several minutes and reaches 600 °C when smoked. Whether ‘stamped out’ in pine needles or thrown out of a car window onto a dry roadside, it is one of the leading causes of fires in France. Doing it properly takes five seconds.
Key points
- Complete extinction = crushed for a long time on a hard MINERAL surface, or drowned.
- In the car: keep the ashtray closed, never leave the window open — a €135 fine, and much worse if a fire breaks out.
- Out and about: a pocket ashtray (€2 from a tobacconist’s). A cigarette butt ‘stamped out with your foot’ in the forest is NOT fully extinguished.
- During high-risk periods, many regulations simply ban smoking in the mountains.
Equipment: pocket ashtray · car ashtray · a little water
Why it’s important
A cigarette does not stop burning when you stop taking puffs: the ember smoulders in the tobacco and can reignite at the slightest breeze. Thrown from a car, the cigarette butt lands on the verge — the driest strip of land in the landscape, mown and exposed — from where fires break out every summer, cutting off motorways and threatening entire neighbourhoods. Investigations into the causes of fires (BDIFF) rank cigarettes among the leading identified causes of accidental fires. They are also the easiest to eliminate from the face of the Earth.
How to do it, step by step
Grind hard for a long time
Mineral surfaces (stone, tarmac, ash tray): roll the cigarette butt firmly for 3–4 seconds until the glowing tobacco is extinguished. On natural ground, this is pointless — the litter insulates it and causes it to reignite.
Or drown him
The dregs at the bottom of a bottle, a puddle, leftover coffee: just a second’s soaking and the matter’s settled. At home: the ashtray with a bit of water in it – never straight into the bin or into a flowerpot (the peat will catch fire).
Try the pocket ashtray
A waterproof box for €2: the cigarette butt is smothered inside. Perfect for hiking, the beach, building sites and outdoor cafés. It ALSO helps tackle pollution (1 cigarette butt = 500 litres of contaminated water).
In the car: ashtray, full stop
Keep the windows on the ash side closed (as draughts suck in the embers), and empty the contents at home — once it has gone out.
In high-risk areas: please refrain from doing so
In the mountains during the summer, smoking is often prohibited by law and is always unwise. Cigarettes should be smoked by the car or at a stone rest stop, not on the path.
The mistakes that ruin everything
- ‘I really did stamp it flat with my foot’ — in 2 cm of dry pine needles, you’ve just buried it alive.
- Flicking a ‘extinguished’ cigarette butt into a grass-lined gutter or a flower box.
- Empty the car ashtray in the car park, into the hedge.
- An e-cigarette left in the sun on the seat — the batteries can catch fire too.
The tip that makes all the difference
Smokers in high-risk areas: keep a pocket ashtray in every key spot — your car, rucksack, summer jacket pocket, glove compartment. At €2 each, the ‘I didn’t have one’ excuse no longer holds water.
Frequently Asked Questions
The risk changes every day. So do your reflexes.
Check the fire alert status for your department, keep track of current fires and report a fire via the Feux de Forêt mobile app.