Apparently These Things Happen...

The other day we were cooking hamburgers outside on the grill and cooking some french fries in the oven. I had mainly been outside, but happened to be getting some cheese out of the fridge when I heard a loud electrical buzzing coming from our electric range, accompanied by a glowing, white light on the inside of the oven. I immediately ran for the breaker box and killed the power and screamed up the stairs for Rick. He came down and got the fire extinguisher out. It was on fire, but we ended up not spraying it, but keeping the oven door closed until it burnt out on its own less than a minute later. Oddly, the fries were perfectly done. The range itself is connected directly to the wall so it cannot be unplugged easily, but fortunately, it is on its own circuit, so we were able to keep the power off for it, but on for everything else. Anyway, we are shopping for a new one, because that one will never see power again if I can help it. What surprised me most is that the range itself was in great shape and had never given us any problems. Also, from reading on the Internet, this kind of thing is more common that you would think. Here is one link I looked at, but there are many others for all kinds of brands. Ours looks like the one in the picture (maybe not quite as clean...) Do I think the house would have burnt down if we didn't notice it right away? I'm not sure, but it certainly would have been possible. Scary!