SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20191228-9124E-2147375734. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: LG LFX21960ST (LG counter depth bottom freezer, french door refrigerator). Incident: My LG refrigerators light did not turn off when the refrigerator door was closed. The light is supposed to turn off when the doors close or after being on for 7 minutes so not to overheat. My daughter discovered the problem when opening the refrigerator and there was a bad burning smell. It has melted much of the plastic cover to a point that I could not remove the cover in order to remove the light bulbs. There is NO switch to turn off the light. We unplugged it, and had to pry the pieces off, which was very difficult without being burnt or cut because it was extremely hot. But not wanting to loose all of our food, we didn't have a lot of time. Some of the food containers had also begun to melt and much food was ruined. What really concerns me is that if it hadn't been noticed, it would be a fire hazard. It had even begun to melt the top of the refrigerator. There should be a safety switch that turns off the lights when overheated - or it should operate as stated that it turns off after 7 minutes. There is also no way to turn it off manually. Had this happened a week earlier when we were out of town, I am afraid it would have caused a fire.