Fire in the hole

I learned what not to do last Sat. I have an XL and have cooked on it for the past 3 years succefully, pulled pork, pulled beef, ribs you name it I have tried to cook it. untill Sat. we were hosting a party of 20 people, the food included 4 spatchcock chickens no problem. Raised grid 425 degress dome temp chickens spent the night uncovered in fridge to dry skin. I have done this very same cook a 100 times with a great outcome. Then it happened I overthought the situation nervous about the outcome I decided to add a drip pan into the mix filled with water so the grease would not burn and taint the birds with burned grease taste. about an hour 15min. into the cook the probe read 165 degrees, birds ready to come off. As the guests gathered to get a glipse of there dinner I slowly lifted the lid to reveal the perfectly browned poultry. They were perfect. I lowered the lid to prepare for the extraction process. I slowly lifted the lid again, as I was removing the closest birds the temp was starting to rise quikly by the time I got to the last bird the grease pan egnited into a fireball, I closed the lid as my brother yelled there's still a man in there, I opened the lid one last time another fireball bigger than the last one exploded out. Well to make a long story short The "last man" was unreachable the bird was burned to a crisp, The good thing was we didn't burn the deck or house down. I guess the moral of the story is if your going to use a drip pan in a high heat cook don't or make sure it has or holds enough liquid for the entire cook because once that liquid is gone you have a bomb waiting to blow up.
FireWalker