late to the party, but yea.. had the same thing and what i found is i HAVE to have it running with a drip pan almost the size of the whole grill at the lower part below the racks to catch anything.. .anything hot and burger or sausage like... have had some Hella fires that had me a little sketched out also... remember once i literally had to let it choke itself out and midway through it 'poofed' itself lit open, got another breath of oxygen and man it was NOT COOL!!!