Spain bans smoking - Outdoors!

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Tom Rankin

Tom Rankin

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I am all for a car smoking ban. For some reason many smokers seem to think the entire planet is their personal ashtray and they just chuck their butts out the car window. This of course leads to many forest fires. During my recent trip to the Dolomites, we saw 6 forest / brush fires on the sides of roads. two of them were quite large. It was fairly obvious from scorch marks and debris that the fires started at the side fo the roads and were blowing away from them. The first suspect would be ciggy butts being chuck out of car windows.

I don't have the stats, but in my experience Europeans smoke more than Americans. Could be the reason we saw so many fires during our trip. I have seen several forest fires started by butts here in the states though. One fire started right on the side of the highway and burned a good chunk of a state forest that I mountian bike a lot in. It is really weird biking though th e charred remains now.

- darren
 
Nah, there's not much better than to get to the top of a pristine peak somewhere in the Whites and crack open the Stolichnaya and break out the Camels. That's what I call living. Just stay upwind of me.
 
darren said:
I am all for a car smoking ban. For some reason many smokers seem to think the entire planet is their personal ashtray and they just chuck their butts out the car window. This of course leads to many forest fires. During my recent trip to the Dolomites, we saw 6 forest / brush fires on the sides of roads. two of them were quite large. It was fairly obvious from scorch marks and debris that the fires started at the side fo the roads and were blowing away from them. The first suspect would be ciggy butts being chuck out of car windows.

I don't have the stats, but in my experience Europeans smoke more than Americans. Could be the reason we saw so many fires during our trip. I have seen several forest fires started by butts here in the states though. One fire started right on the side of the highway and burned a good chunk of a state forest that I mountian bike a lot in. It is really weird biking though the charred remains now.

- darren
Click to expand...

Well, there are already laws against tossing lighted cigarettes out the window. But...

I was driving behind a cop, who was driving behind another car. The guy chucked a cig out his window, and it went right under the cop's car. Did he stop him? No!!!

If you ever walk along the edge of a busy road, you will see several butts per linear foot, it's disgusting! :mad:

But I can see we're preaching to the choir here! :D :D
 
OK, I stood up

to a political poster last week and took my lumps for asking that a post derogatory to the President be modified, which it was. I got negative reputation points for standing up for my country and my president, which saddened me.
Can't we abide by the ban on politics on this site? Everyone knows this a contentious subject now. Why start a fight?
 
darren said:
I am all for a car smoking ban. For some reason many smokers seem to think the entire planet is their personal ashtray and they just chuck their butts out the car window.
Click to expand...
Smoking while driving is also dangerous--general distraction plus extreme distraction if you drop some hot ash on yourself.

Had a passenger drop some hot ash on herself once...

Doug
 
I didn't consider forest fires and butts to be political but now that I look at the word ban, I guess it could be taken as political since a ban would have to be made by the government.

So, I'll retract the ban part and just put out the request that smokers (which all of us are not) who drive in backcountry areas (which all of us here do) keep their butts in the car and not huck them out the window.

As for Tom's comment about walking along side a busy road, you can also see it by biking on the side of roads. The sides of roads are just covered with ciggy butts. One really weird thing that I have noticed many, many times while road biking is that it seems that some of the people who actually use the ashtray in their car stop at stop signs or red lights when the ash tray is full and then just open the car door and dump the whole thing out. Bizarre. Why bother collecting the ash and butts at all?

So, open request I guess, keep the butts in the car. Those of us who hike, bike, and sleep in tents in the forests will appreciate it.

- darren
 
jjmcgo said:
to a political poster last week and took my lumps for asking that a post derogatory to the President be modified, which it was. I got negative reputation points for standing up for my country and my president, which saddened me.
Can't we abide by the ban on politics on this site? Everyone knows this a contentious subject now. Why start a fight?
Click to expand...

Let me congradulate you to offset the negative points. ;)

On a very regular basis, I remove from the forest beer cans, soda cans, water bottles, food wrappers, etc.,etc. Shall we ban all these legal products as well? Shall we self-govern or shall we demand to be evermore restricted by our government? :mad:

Live Free Or Die!!!
 
Last edited:
forestnome said:
On a very regular basis, I remove from the forest beer cans, soda cans, water bottles, food wrappers, etc.,etc. Shall we ban all these legal products as well?
Click to expand...

I don't like beer cans in the woods either, but I have never seen one start a forest fire.

I thought we said we would leave the government out of it? This is not about politics, it is about common sense. Common sense should tell people not to throw fire out their car window. But of course, as I think it was Voltaire said, common sense is not so common.

Breath Free or Die! (cancer, heart disease, lung disease, burned alive in a forest fire, take your pick)

- darren
 
"I thought we said we would leave the government out of it? This is not about politics, it is about common sense" - darren

From the article posted by Yahoo:
“Spaniards are no longer allowed to smoke as they take a Sunday stroll in the woods, under new government rules aimed at curbing the risk of fires such as a recent one in which 11 firefighters died.”

The line “...under new government rules.....” merely hints at governmental interference with ones right to smoke. This has been a political discussion from post #1.

Voltaire also said "It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."
 
A New Jersey legislator was on Tucker Carlson's show on MSNBC last night talking about the proposed smoking ban in cars. The distraction factor was his reasoning. Tucker wasn't buying his argument. I'm not sure if they ended up talking about fires because I just couldn't listen any more.

JohnL
 
keepin' on said:
From the article posted by Yahoo:
“Spaniards are no longer allowed to smoke as they take a Sunday stroll in the woods, under new government rules aimed at curbing the risk of fires such as a recent one in which 11 firefighters died.”
Click to expand...

Well, I guess if you live in Spain then it is political for you. My guess is most of the readers here are not from Spain.

There is no politics involved if we discuss the threat of forest fires caused by cigarette butts.


- darren
 
darren said:
There is no politics involved if we discuss the threat of forest fires caused by cigarette butts.
Click to expand...

Darren,

Sorry, I knew I should've left this one alone. Mommy-government drives me nuts. I know that other garbage won't start fires. There are existing laws against littering. Those who break this law will most definately break a new law banning butts because they are addicted!!! There is already a new black market for cigarettes, created by the high cost which resulted from punitive taxation. Tobacco addicts will NEVER stop smoking just beacause of a new law. Making butts illegal in a car will ENCOURAGE smokers to get rid of the evidence(throw them out the window)!!!

I'm glad we share a common reverence for the forest. :)
 
Another quick point...

Lately, I've been doing litter patrol at trailheads, or along the road nearby, after hikes. I've noticed that beer/alcohol containers outnumber all other garbage items combined(excluding butts) by about 50 to 1! This is obviously not the true ratio of products consumed. The open alcohol containers are the only items that are illegal to have in the car. The unintended consequence of the law is litter. I'm not against this law, but that is the reality.

'nuff said.
 
fn, I agree with your logic. New laws are seldom the answer. Lack of enforcement of existing laws is usually the culprit. In this case, it is clear. The police do not seem to enfoce littering laws on people who throw butts out the window. A new law banning cigarettes in cars is not what is required, enforcement of littering laws is what is required.

I guess I am all "fired up" about this issue because I just saw 6 fires in the last 2 weeks that were most likely caused by cigarette butts being thrown out of car windows. It drove me nuts. 1) I love the woods 2) my father was a firefighter for 35 years 3) firefighters die in fires caused by the careless disposal of cigarette butts.

- darren
 
When driving behind a smoker who tosses a butt (not a mooner!) out the window, I flick my brights two or three times. Sends a message in a safe, non- confrontational way.

Last year, as a volunteer firefighter, I helped extinguish a brush fire caused by a cigarette butt. The fire was headed quickly up a steep hillside. I was the only one on my town's crew who was able to climb with a hand pump water pack on my back. I owe this to my hiking experience.

Live free and conscientiously.......Jade
 
wondering if all you that want the smoking ban feel about smoking the ganja -

I don't smoke either but have good buddies that smoke both (and then some) - not making any accusations here (but my guess is we have many dope smokers on the board here - not a bad thing) about anyone by any means - but many of my earthy freinds who really blast butt smokers - think the weed should be legalized - I don't see the the logic - I don't care either way about cigs or the whacky tobacky - just don't make the hootch illegal.
 
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