--- title: Seattle Man Burns Down House Trying to Kill Spider With Spray Paint description: And after all that, it's not even clear if the spider died canonical: https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-16T14:12:57.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:11:44.610Z og:title: Man Tries to Kill a Spider and Ends Up Burning His House Down og:description: And it's not even clear if the spider ended up dying og:url: https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda757cc39514a683/69869be5810bbb6b30c929d6/burninghouse.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: burninghouse og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Man Tries to Kill a Spider and Ends Up Burning His House Down twitter:description: And it's not even clear if the spider ended up dying twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda757cc39514a683/69869be5810bbb6b30c929d6/burninghouse.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Man Tries to Kill a Spider and Ends Up Burning His House Down by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jul 16, 2014 2:12 PM UTC  Getty Images by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jul 16, 2014 2:12 PM UTC A man who apparently took the expression “kill it with fire” just a tad too literally caused his house to go up in flames after he attempted to kill a spider with a lighter and a can of spray paint. He spotted the eight-legged intruder in the laundry room of his West Seattle home Tuesday evening and promptly went after it, local ABC affiliate KOMO [reports](http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Man-tries-to-kill-spider-with-spray-paint-and-lighter-burns-down-house-267285431.html). Firefighters arrived at the scene and eventually extinguished the blaze, but the fire had already caused significant damage. It will cost around $40,000 to repair the house and another $20,000 to repair or replace the items inside. We’d like to take this opportunity to advise people to STOP DOING THIS. This [keeps happening](http://time.com/2941320/kansas-woman-sets-house-on-fire-to-kill-spider/). Do not use fire to kill bugs. Don’t do it. Just say no. You’re probably thinking, _Well, at least the fire must have killed the spider! Ha-ha-ha!_ But no. Nobody can confirm if the spider survived or not. So basically, this spider could have gotten out alive and then watched the house burn from the safety of a nearby tree, probably petting a white cat and laughing maniacally. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/"},"headline":"Man Tries to Kill a Spider and Ends Up Burning His House Down","datePublished":"2014-07-16T14:12:57.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:11:44.610Z","description":"And after all that, it's not even clear if the spider died","url":"https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/","keywords":["Newsfeed","U.S.","Seattle","spiders"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda757cc39514a683/69869be5810bbb6b30c929d6/burninghouse.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda757cc39514a683/69869be5810bbb6b30c929d6/burninghouse.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"burninghouse","caption":"","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2991835/man-tries-to-kill-a-spider-and-ends-up-burning-his-house-down/","name":"Man Tries to Kill a Spider and Ends Up Burning His House Down"}}]}] ```