My really weird morning surprise

Welcome aboard, Peter. You made me go check my stack of saved egg cartons. Although there was no sign of combustion, it did appear that the cartons caused my entire shop to be a chaotic mess of unfinished projects, with huge stacks of disorganized wood and tools. Never would have known about the carton effect without your help.

Brent Dowell said:

Found the answer for you.

It's all right here. Spontaneously Combustible Eggs. Fairly common as this article shows.

http://en.illogicopedia.org/wiki/Spontaneously_Combustible_Eggs

Click to expand...

Some people might read that and actually believe it. Good one for the Feds new disinformation department.

I’ve worked on the paper and corrugated carton industry for 26 years. Eggs cartons are made from recycled paper pulp which is not cleaned from metal particles and other components as much or thoroughly as recycled paper for other uses like printing or food wrapping. Moreover many of od those egg cartons are made in third world countries just by soaking any paper into water, disgregate the fibres to get the pulp and create the cartons directly with no filtering of chemical substances or particles.

My guess, is that some of those particles created a chemical reaction or fermentation maybe with a tyny bit of chicken poo of one of the eggs creating heat which smouldered along the rest of the carton. Another guess is that a spark created by static electricy by the friction of the cartons among themselves when introducing them in the fridge caught on the carton and smouldered along them. Those cartons are very porous which makes it quite feasible, the air currents created by opening and closing the fridge door could also have helped in spreading the ember.

But I wouldn’t discard the ancient aliens option though…

I guess it's a good thing I buy my eggs in Styrofoam cartons? (and never save them)

Just a wild guess, but is your stove next to your refrigerator? Did you set the egg cartons on the stove just before putting them into the fridge? If so, you may have ignited the bottom/back by a not quite cold stove burner or pilot light. This is just a thought and it might be completely wrong without even seeing your kitchen layout and kitchen habits.

I was a trained fire investigator and the Fire Marshal/Electrical Safety Engineer of a 3.7 million sq ft research and manufacturing facility on nearly 1,400 acres for 7 years before I retired, so I'm "fire aware" and always looking for the root cause of fires. It seems to be a part of me now.

Charley