When a Fire or Burn Injury Takes the Person You Love

When a Severe Burn Takes the Person You Love

If you’re reading this, you may have just lost someone to a fire, an explosion, or a burn injury that turned into something no one could survive. There is nothing we can write that makes that lighter. No claim, no settlement, and no verdict brings your person back to the dinner table.

What a wrongful death case can do is answer the questions that pile up while you’re grieving — who was responsible, whether it could have been prevented, and what the law lets your family do next. This page is written for the people left behind: a surviving spouse, a parent, an adult child, or the family member now trying to hold everything together. We’ve tried to answer the real questions families ask us, in plain language, without headline dollar figures or promises we can’t keep.

CHG Personal Injury Lawyers focuses on catastrophic and fatal injuries — including severe burns — across Florida (Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Jacksonville) and nationwide. Reaching out costs nothing and commits you to nothing.

Request a free, confidential case evaluation.

When a Preventable Fire or Explosion Was Someone Else’s Fault

Here is a situation we see often. A loved one dies in a fire at an apartment complex where the smoke detectors didn’t work and the exits were blocked. Or in an explosion caused by a gas line no one maintained. Or in a fuel fire after a truck crash that never should have happened. In each case, someone had a duty to keep people reasonably safe — and didn’t.

When a property owner, landlord, or business fails to fix known dangers and someone is killed as a result, the law calls that premises liability. When the failure involves security or safety systems that should have prevented harm — working locks and gates, alarms, fire-suppression equipment, adequate lighting — you may hear the term negligent security. You don’t need to know these words to have a claim. You just need to have lost someone because a person or company didn’t do what safety required.

Severe burns that turn fatal often come from:

• Fires in apartment buildings, hotels, or workplaces — often tied to missing smoke detectors, disabled alarms, or blocked exits
• Explosions, including gas leaks and industrial blasts
• Electrical burns from faulty wiring or ungrounded equipment
• Chemical burns from mishandled dangerous substances
• Fuel fires in truck and vehicle crashes

Responsibility can rest with a landlord who ignored code violations, a manufacturer who sold a defective product, a trucking company that skipped safety rules, or a contractor whose work created the hazard. Often more than one party shares the blame.

Two Kinds of Losses: The Estate’s and the Family’s

Florida law recognizes that a burn death causes two very different kinds of harm, and it’s worth understanding the distinction at a high level. (This is general information, not legal advice about your specific case.)

Severe burns rarely take a life instantly. Many people survive the initial injury and spend days or weeks in a burn unit before their body cannot recover. The law accounts for that period. Broadly speaking:

• The estate’s claim can address what your loved one endured before death — the medical treatment, and, in appropriate cases, the pain and suffering they experienced between the injury and their passing.
• The survivors’ wrongful-death claim addresses your family’s losses — the financial support, the guidance, and the companionship that ended when they died.

Both are governed by the Florida Wrongful Death Act, Fla. Stat. §768.21. Sorting out which losses belong where is our job, not yours.

“He Didn’t Die Right Away” — Why Delayed Death Still Counts

Families often worry that because their loved one survived the fire itself and died later — of infection, sepsis, or organ failure that set in during treatment — the death somehow “doesn’t count” as caused by the burn. It does.

Serious burns commonly lead to fatal complications days or weeks after the event. Infection and sepsis are among the leading causes of death in burn patients who survive the initial injury. What matters legally is causation, not timing: if the burn set off the chain of medical events that ended your loved one’s life, that death can support a wrongful-death claim. The gap between the injury and the death does not erase the responsible party’s accountability. Medical experts help us connect that chain clearly.

Who Can File in Florida

In Florida, only one person files the lawsuit: the personal representative of the deceased person’s estate. But the claim is brought for the benefit of the surviving family members.

Under the Florida Wrongful Death Act, the survivors who may recover include:

• The surviving spouse
• Children of the person who died
• Parents of the person who died
• Certain blood relatives or adoptive siblings who depended on the deceased for support

The “personal representative” is simply the person legally in charge of the estate. If there was a will, it usually names that person. If there wasn’t, a court can appoint one — often a close family member. If this feels overwhelming during grief, that’s understandable. Florida’s statutes are published officially at Online Sunshine, and we’ll walk you through only the parts that apply to your family.

What Compensation the Law Allows

Florida law lets families recover several categories of damages. No lawyer — including us — can honestly promise a specific amount. What we can do is explain what the law generally covers.

Survivor damages may include:

• Loss of financial support and services the deceased provided
• Loss of companionship, guidance, and protection
• Mental pain and suffering (for a spouse, children, and in some cases parents)

Estate damages may include:

• Lost earnings and the savings the deceased would likely have accumulated
• Medical bills for treating the burn before death
• Funeral and burial expenses

Burn deaths carry unusually high costs, in part because of the intensive care involved. According to the American Burn Association, treatment for a major burn is among the most expensive of any injury, often involving prolonged ICU stays and repeated surgeries. Those bills are real and relevant to your claim.

Florida also applies a modified comparative-fault rule under Fla. Stat. §768.81, which can reduce recovery if the deceased is found partly at fault. We’ll give you an honest read on how that applies — not a rosy one.

How the Process Works

We handle the legal work so your family can focus on grieving. Here’s the path:

1. Free case evaluation. We listen, review what happened, and explain your options in plain language.
2. Investigation. We move quickly to preserve evidence — fire and explosion reports, product records, truck data, witness statements, and the scene itself. Fire-origin, medical, and economic experts often play a central role.
3. Identifying responsible parties. Landlords, product makers, trucking companies, contractors, and their insurers all come into view.
4. Claim and negotiation. We prepare a demand and negotiate with the insurers for a fair result.
5. Litigation if needed. If no fair offer comes, we file suit and, when necessary, take the case to trial.

We work on a contingency-fee basis: no upfront fees, and our fee comes from any recovery, so getting started costs you nothing out of pocket.

Timing genuinely matters here. In burn and fire cases, physical evidence — scene debris, a defective appliance, a damaged wiring panel — can be cleaned up, repaired, or discarded within days. Contact us so we can begin protecting that evidence now.

Florida’s Deadline to File

Florida generally allows two years from the date of death to file a wrongful death lawsuit, under Fla. Stat. §95.11. Miss that window, and the right to recover is usually lost for good.

Some situations have exceptions, and claims against government entities follow special, often shorter, notice rules. For cases outside Florida, the deadline varies by state — and can be shorter than you’d expect. Because burn and fire evidence fades so fast, waiting can weaken a case long before any deadline arrives. A short call can confirm the exact deadline for your family’s situation.

Bilingual, Nationwide Help

We provide services in both English and Spanish, so grieving families aren’t forced to navigate legal decisions in a language that isn’t their own. Interpreters and Spanish-speaking team members are part of how we work, not an afterthought.

We’re based in Florida and take cases nationwide. When a death happened in another state, we coordinate with that state’s laws and deadlines and, where needed, work with local counsel — so where the accident happened doesn’t leave your family without help.

Why Families Turn to CHG Personal Injury Lawyers

• Licensed attorneys admitted to The Florida Bar, handling catastrophic and fatal-injury cases nationwide
• Experience coordinating fire-origin, medical, and economic experts to prove causation and loss
• Bilingual (English/Spanish) support at every step
• A plain-language approach that treats every family with dignity

We won’t guarantee a result, and we won’t call ourselves “best” or “#1.” We’ll give you honest guidance you can act on.

Talk With Us When You’re Ready

You’re facing one of the hardest losses there is. You deserve clear answers and a team that treats your family with respect. A CHG Personal Injury Lawyers attorney can review your case for free, with no obligation and no upfront cost, and we can come to you if needed.

Contact us for a free, confidential case evaluation. Want to understand these injuries first? Visit our severe burn injuries resource center.

Frequently Asked Questions