“I enjoyed the solstice with a joyful hostess; where a joyful hostess is, there’s a joyful solstice!”

We all enjoy joyful summer solstice! It sometimes seems that we wait for summer solstice more than we wait for Christmas or birthdays! And why not when summer solstice is in the very middle of the summer – midsummer when the day is the longest but the night – the shortest. This affords a chance to enjoy fun holidays with your family and friends carelessly forgetting about your work and daily troubles. However, BTA Baltic Insurance Company AAS (hereinafter – BTA) wishes to remind you that you must take responsibility for your actions. Therefore, BTA invites all who intend to enjoy solstice: eat, drink and jump but do it with a cool head and do not go overboard!

“Summer solstice usually comes with a great deal of fun but unfortunately when the same fun goes out of the limits it becomes a great risk to be involved in an accident. A person needs fun, laughter and happiness, but one must know how to have fun, doing it responsibly. To have a careless celebration and avoid unnecessary troubles, all people celebrating summer solstice must keep in mind their responsibility and be sure that they observe it. The responsibility is one of our, BTA’s, core values. Therefore, we invite all those who celebrate summer solstice – do it with great deal of responsibility!” encourages Kārlis Liepiņš, BTA Claims Handling Department Director.

Before you get ready for summer solstice, you might want to take a look at the following seven recommendations by BTA, which could become handy to have a safe and careless celebration.

1. Store your car keys in a safe place. If you drive a car or the driver is any of your family members, we advise storing your car keys in a safe place or handing them over to the host. This is for your own safety – just in case you manage to drink a beer or two more than you should and you or someone else would not get an urge to drive while under the influence of alcohol. When a person is intoxicated, everything seems much more simple and possible, and this is why many “daredevils” believe that they “can” drink and drive. But they cannot! Storing your keys away is crucial also for those levelheaded drivers, who do not drink at all when there is any chance of driving. This advice should be kept in mind by the host of the solstice celebrations, who must avoid at all costs that a guest drinks and drives. Your keys must also be stored in a safe place to avoid losing them during the celebration so that you could get home afterwards without any problems.

2. Set the fire in the right way! Nowadays the fastest and easiest way towards grilling or setting fire to a bonfire seems rather straightforward – splash your lighter fluid on charcoals or firewood, set fire and you are good to go! However, bear in mind that after using a lighter fluid, you must check your hands to be sure that there are no residues of this flammable fluid, and only then you can use matches or lighters. Be especially careful in close proximity of a grill! Do not stand too close when lighter fluid is splashed over glowing charcoal. Just one wrong move with this fluid can lead to very unpleasant burns. Moreover, you should never grill under a roof or tree branches because this puts your house and all the people in it in great danger. Don’t let children stand too close to a grill.

3. Make sure that your bonfire is safe. Setting your bonfire is also a highly responsible task to do. It is not advised to set a bonfire close to trees, buildings, or flammable materials. There must always be stones around your bonfire or the site must be defined with a wall of sand. This will prevent fire from spreading across dry grass and bushes. This is especially important this year when there has been no rain for the last month and a half; therefore, grass and bushes are dry and can catch fire almost instantaneity.  You should also better forget about having a bonfire in the woods. The most important thing is to never leave bonfire unattended. You should also keep your children away from the bonfire, especially when the bonfire is actively burning. When people celebrating solstice go to sleep, extinguish the fire completely to prevent any possibility of fire breaking out. The best method is to pour a good bucket of water over the bonfire or cover it with sand.

4. Jumping over bonfire. A bonfire is the central element in summer solstice. When the fire has burned for a while, people traditionally jump over the bonfire. Be smart and jump only when a) bonfire is not too high and wide, b) you are not too tipsy, c) your clothes are not too loose and easily flammable, d) you are physically capable of making the jump. Before jumping over the bonfire, you should better try and jump over a stack of firewood or a bench. Jumping over a bonfire is a traditional thing, yet it is a highly dangerous tradition, because every year incidents occur when somebody fails to make the jump and fire catches the clothes or the person even falls into the fire and gets serious burns.

5. Say NO to swimming at night! Summer solstice this year promises to be rather hot, and the water in rivers and lakes is somewhat nice. When people choose to celebrate next to waters, they sometimes have an idea to swim at night. Even medics say that this is one of the most dangerous things you could do and, therefore, you should avoid doing this at all costs. This is especially important for those celebrants, who have had a drink or two. In the nighttime, you should never organize swimming competitions or try to break the world record in distance swimming. Better, go for a swim during the day. However, during the daytime you should always keep in mind: a) never leave children unattended next to any kind of waterbodies, b) do not swim too far from the bank or in unfamiliar places, c) do not be hotheaded and don’t jump in the water from great heights or “head-first”, d) do not go in water drunk and don’t allow others to do the same.

6. Eat and drink – but don’t go crazy! It’s even hard to imagine summer solstice without beer but you should never let yourself drink too much beer or any other alcoholic beverages. The best solstice celebration is when you can wake up the next morning hangover-free. Indeed, this is what we wish you! The same applies to insatiable eating. Grilled meat and sausages, cheese and half-sour pickles… all these and more foods will be there the next day as well! Furthermore, it is also important to know what you are eating. Your meat cannot be left in the sunlight, and it must be fresh at all times! Meat that has gone bad can seriously harm your health. The most important thing is to eat and drink without going overboard and without any rush…

7. When looking for the fern flower… The mythological fern flower back charmed people back in the olden days and today as well… No, it is not our recommendation to abandon seeking the fern flower! We only wish to remind you that at the highest point during your search for the fern flower you can encounter a snake. To make things even worse, it may be hard to see the snake in the dark. You should also be aware of ticks. If you find yourself in a meadow picking summer flowers, always check your legs for ticks after coming out of the meadow.

Lastly, on the next morrow after the summer solstice cooler heads must prevail and you should carefully think over whether you are ready to drive your car. The sole fact that you must be back at work next day cannot be the argument! Ask for help or find another way how to get back home!

BTA wishes you a joyful, safe, responsible and healthy summer solstice!

About BTA

BTA Baltic Insurance Company is one of the leading insurance companies in the Baltics, offering the broadest range of non-life insurance services in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. BTA employs more than 1 000 employees in the Baltics. The largest shareholder of BTA is Vienna Insurance Group AG with 200 years of experience in the insurance industry. More than 50 companies in 25 countries constitute the group, which employs 25,000 employees. Vienna Insurance Group AG is a clear leader in its core markets in Europe maintaining high rating of financial stability – Standard & Poor’s A+ (stable outlook), with a listing on the Vienna and the Prague Stock Exchange.

Additional information:

Elīna Rasmane

Marketing and Public Relations Department Director

BTA Baltic Insurance Company AAS

e-mail: elina.rasmane@bta.lv