LEWISTON – Fire Inspector Paul Ouellette responded to a complaint of no heat at a local apartment and found that the entire family had moved their beds into the kitchen and turned on the electric cooking stove for warmth.

“They had four burners glowing red-hot, and all these papers and piles of clothes around them,” Ouellette said.

It’s one example of how people are trying to keep their homes warm this winter when they run out of heating oil. Many are taking risks with space heaters, wood stoves and kitchen ovens, fire officials said Wednesday.

“They’re doing anything they can to stay warm,” said Auburn Fire Prevention Officer Gary Simard. “You can’t blame them, but they have to be careful.”

Simard said he’s seen many apartments with multiple space heaters plugged into a single outlet or with gas or kerosene heaters burning next to cribs in closed rooms.

“What’s happening is, people are running out of oil, and they’re getting fed up and calling us,” Simard said.

Police and fire officials are the ones who answer emergency calls for no heat.

They’ve seen plenty of risky heating solutions.

One third-floor apartment dweller had run a 50-foot extension cord up the stairwell from the second floor and plugged a surge protector to run three electric space heaters.

“Surge protectors don’t stop wires from heating up,” Simard said. Electric space heaters can overpower internal wiring, causing a fire in the walls.

“That’s what would have happened if we hadn’t shown up,” Simard said. “The fire would have started down on the second floor, in the wall behind that outlet.”

Liquid-fuel heaters are also a problem. Some people use them in closed rooms – allowing fumes and carbon monoxide to build up. Others keep them stored near paper or fuel. Some try to refill the heaters while they’re still hot.

“We had one woman catch her feet and hand on fire that way,” Ouellette said.

Common sense is key.

“If people would just use these things the way they were meant to be used, everything would be fine,” Simard said.

“They are temporary solutions to warm up a single room, not central heating systems. People just need to treat them like that.”