Thinking back this year and in past years . . . quite honestly I can only remember one near miss involving a pellet stove that was due to a manufacturer defect . . . all other fires with woodstoves (can't think of any with pellet stoves) have been as Marty S. mentioned . . . operator error . . . failure to clean a chimney, failure to install the stove to manufacturer specs, failure to dispose of ashes correctly, etc.