In an interview with People published on Tuesday (December 13th), Jay Leno shared his experience of the garage fire that left him suffering from second and third-degree burns last month.
“With a steam car, you have gasoline, but you also have a vaporizer which is heated by a pilot light to turn water into steam,” the former Tonight Show host explained. While he was under the car trying to unclog one of the lines, “I got a face full of gasoline,” he recalled. “I knew how close I was to the pilot light and I thought 'Uh oh.'”
“It felt exactly like my face was on fire,” Leno said. “Maybe like the most intense sunburn you've ever had, that'd be fair to say.”
Leno closed his eyes and held his breath as he tried to get out from underneath the car, before his friend, Dave Killackey, helped him. “I'm not a panicky guy, but I knew if I breathed in I could scorch my lungs,” he said. “I was under the car maybe 10 seconds before Dave pulled me out. Any longer than that I could have lost my eye.”