Fire Challenge

About

Fire Challenge is a dare game in which the participant voluntarily sets oneself on fire for a short period of time by applying flammable liquids or igniting combustible parts of one’s body and filming the outcome, similar to other pain endurance challenges that have spread through the social media, such as the Eraser Challenge and the Hot Pepper Challenge.

Origin

One of the first fire challenge videos uploaded to YouTube is titled “Fire challenge” and was uploaded on April 5th, 2012, by YouTuber 1BlazinEagle1^[2]. The video features the YouTuber lighting his chest hair on fire. As of July 2014, the video has gained over 100,000 views.

Spread

On April 7th, 2013, Viner RolandConstantino^[7] introduced the hashtag #FireChallenge to accompany Vines that involve bringing a flame in contact (or near contact) with your body. As of July 2014, the Vine has gained over 1,000 loops.

On June 7th, 2013, YouTuber Fana Long^[9] uploaded a video titled “Hand sanitizer and fire challenge.” As of July 2014, the video has gained over 2,000 views. On June 24th, 2013, YouTuber 1BlazinEagle1 uploaded a video titled “Nuts & Chest Fire challenge” which featured a group of men lighting their chest hair, leg hair and pants on fire. As of July 2014, the video has gained over 30,000 views.

Media coverage of the challenge increased in late July of 2014, after teenager James Shores died after attempting the challenge in Buffalo, New York^[3] and a teenager in Lexington, Kentucky^[4] was hospitalized for his injuries suffered from attempting the challenge. On July 29th, Live Leak^[8] posted a video of a young man attempting the challenge titled “Fire Challenge Gone Wrong,” within 24 hours the video gained over 80,000 views.

Also on July 29th, 2014, the challenge trend and the injured teens were covered in an article published on Bustle^[5] and The Washington Post.^[6] The following day the challenge was covered by The Daily Dot^[1].