> Yes, in fact the biggest fire I ever worked on was started by friction.
We
> had a very severe wind storm and it blew a dead tree down.  It was on a
> VERY steep hillside and we were in the middle of a drought then also.  By
> the time that the tree got to the bottom of the hill there was plenty of
> heat to ignite the very dry underbrush in the area.  Lightning is of
course
> the normal way that most fires started where I was at.

I've seen spontaneous combustion before.  It was in a neighbors back yard
(the type of neighbor that nobody wants) who just kept pileing up their
mowed grass until it was about 15 feet X 10 Fett 4 feet tall.
Well, they are finally gotten themselves evicted, and being the type of kid
I was, I was playing in their (ex)yard and suddently the pile of grass just
went up.... course I got blamed for it anyway, but their got an apology when
it went up again a day later after being soaked pretty good.
I could imagine that could also happen in the wild if a ton of leaves or
something collected in a crevasse, after a while it could go poof!

Brian Cluff
Team Snaptek