Evaluation of an Ozone Chamber as a Routine Method to Decontaminate Firefighters’ PPE

Ozone chambers have emerged as an alternative method to decontaminate firefighters’ Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) from toxic fire residues. This work evaluated the efficiency of using an ozone chamber to clean firefighters’ PPE. This was achieved by studying the degradation of pyrene and 9-methylanthracene polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The following experiments were performed: (i) insufflating ozone into PAH solutions (homogeneous setup), and (ii) exposing pieces of PPE impregnated with the PAHs to an ozone atmosphere for up to one hour (heterogeneous setup). The ozonolysis products were assessed by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), Thin-Layer Chromatography (TLC), and Mass Spectrometry (MS) analysis. In the homogeneous experiments, compounds of a higher molecular weight were produced due to the incorporation of oxygen into the PAH structures. Some of these new compounds included 4-oxapyren-5-one (m/z 220) and phenanthrene-4,5-dicarboxaldehyde (m/z 234) from pyrene; or 9-anthracenecarboxaldehyde (m/z 207) and hydroxy-9,10-anthracenedione (m/z 225) from 9-methylanthracene. In the heterogeneous experiments, a lower oxidation was revealed, since no byproducts were detected using FTIR and TLC, but only using MS. However, in both experiments, significant amounts of the original PAHs were still present even after one hour of ozone treatment. Thus, although some partial chemical degradation was observed, the remaining PAH and the new oxygenated-PAH compounds (equally or more toxic than the initial molecules) alerted us of the risks to firefighters’ health when using an ozone chamber as a unique decontamination method. These results do not prove the ozone-advertised efficiency of the ozone chambers for decontaminating (degrading the toxic combustion residues into innocuous compounds) firefighters’ PPE.

Use of Geopolymer Matrix Composites in the Construction of Fire Doors

Protection and safety of workers in plants with the danger of fire is always the first place. They are currently used in devices that are designed to quickly separate the fire residues from workers such as steel fire doors filled with non-combustible materials that insulate the prescribed time up to 600 ° C. As the demands for safety was the requirement for resistance to temperatures higher than 600 ° C. [1, 2]. Post relates to improvements refractory properties of steel gates based geopolymer matrix composites. They are analyzed the properties of different materials such as fillers geopolymer matrix, durability and affinity to steel parts of the door structure.

Study on Fire Residues in Pure Cotton Fabric Combustion

Residual accelerant from fire debris is the major evidence in the fire investigation. Because all evidences are almost damaged by fire, many isolation methods of analytical chemistry has been already used in extracting trace residue. In this paper, ultrasonic extraction is applied to isolate the residual accelerant and hexane as the solvent. The solution obtained from the residue is tested by GC-MS to analyze their total ion chromatogram (TIC). The chromatographic patterns observed for ignitable liquids are different from the patterns observed for without ignitable liquids. The composition of two samples and content of the fire residues have been analyzed. It’s very important for forensic chemist to distinguish the arson or natural fire.