Crappy Chinese manufacturing coupled with a Hot Head from a bad batch...

We had a fire. It appears that the hose connected to my torch softened at the connector to the torch and blew off while we were in the middle of using it.  From all appearances, the reason the hose softened was the torch got hot all the way to the torch/hose coupling, and the reason the hose came off was that the hose wasn't clamped tightly enough to the barbed fitting by the manufacturer. 


Here's a picture of the culprit:

I jumped back quickly enough, but there was flame spewing out the end of the hose.  We were able to put the fire out relatively quickly with the fire extinguisher and turned off the tank.  When I was working with the torch night before last I noticed the valve knob was hot, but I didn't think it was THAT hot, and today the hose coupling failed, and we had a fire.


I'm lucky there wasn't any appreciable damage.  We were using the torch for our kiln, and the tent shelter we set up for the kiln was the only thing that was damaged.  We needed to get a new tent anyway.


(I wonder what our guardian angel's name is. He does good work.)