Double-take, # 167

Just Liam is understandably puzzled by the use of the verb in this newspaper placard in York:

The idea of spontaneity, which requires the construction ‘catches fire’, seems here to have been confused with the idea of agency, ‘is set on fire’. Oxford Dictionaries (fire, 11) confirms that the use of ‘set’ in relation to ‘fire’ needs both a specific preposition and an object, either in the form of ‘set fire to something’ or ‘set something on fire’.

The publication that issued the placard is simply called The Press. The wording is not replicated at the top of the online story, where there is no headline at all, but instead a rather odd and archaic sweep of key points (with rather odd and archaic random capitalization) separated by dashes:

Link: The Press, ‘Bus fire in York […]’

bus engine sets on fire