Has to do with the large amounts of flammable oil that inevitably spill out.
Some years ago, I saw a video, done by Consumer Reports, I think, that showed a fireman, in full heat gear, using a turkey fryer, and showing how incredibly easy it is to spill oil.
Every Thanksgiving, there are always quite a few turkey fryer accidents.
1) they overfill the pot, even though every frier I have ever purchased comes with a table of turkey weight to oil (not perfect obv but generally they are conservative, at worst you must add a little oil once the bird is in the frier). Sometimes this table is literally etched into the pot. Failure here will overflow the oil and send it into the burner causing a fire, once that fire reaches the inside of the pot .. yaknow, not great.
2) they don't sufficiently dry the bird or even worse put it in frozen. The previous causes potential spatter that could 'boil over' and cause fire. The later i've seen some videos of .. much less great.
Let's be clear, you can do exactly this stupid shit deep frying something on your stovestop, at least with a turkey frier you can be outside away from flammable things.
It's pretty easy to deep fry a turkey safely and in fact every year I probably fry between 10-15 birds (I love turkey). On thanksgiving I generally end up frying 5-7 birds for my family and some of the neighbors who either are to scared or just don't want to buy a setup, either way I'm happy to do it for them.
1) make sure your oil level is right according to the pots instruction.
2) make sure your bird is thawed and pat it dry inside and out
3) heat the oil on the burner, but move the pot off the burner before inserting the turkey, also remove the pot before removing the turkey.
Some years ago, I saw a video, done by Consumer Reports, I think, that showed a fireman, in full heat gear, using a turkey fryer, and showing how incredibly easy it is to spill oil.
Every Thanksgiving, there are always quite a few turkey fryer accidents.