‘The way my jaw dropped’: Fire survivor provides harrowing proof that you should shut your bedroom door at night

Should you shut your bedroom door at night? Not only should you do it for the simple reason that night demons can’t get you (the ones that try and grab your ankle as you’re running to bed after flicking the light switch? Yeah, those), but there’s also a much more practical reason. Apparently, closing your bedroom door at night gives a whole new meaning to safety first.

According to the NFPA, “UL (Underwriters Laboratories) research shows how a closed door can keep smoke out of a bedroom longer as well as change the flow of heat and toxic gases, acting as a shield for someone trapped and unable to get out of a fire.”

As @jakenoxon on TikTok has proven, closing a door to repel a fire can work wonders — and can even save your or a loved one’s life. In the above TikTok, we see the before and after of a cozy home destroyed by an out of control fire. Jake shows us his bathroom, which has a lovely beige color to it with a bunch of flowers next to the sink and artwork adorning the walls.

As he pans the camera around the bathroom, which is still intact, Jake says, “You know how they always told you to keep your door shut at night just in case there’s a fire?” He then opens the bathroom door, revealing a whole corridor and multiple bedrooms destroyed by the raging fire. It’s quite a shocking contrast, so we can only assume that someone locked themselves in the bathroom to escape the fire and it obviously worked.

We can only hope that everyone involved managed to get out safely, but let this be a lesson for the future. Keep your doors closed because you never really know.