
Perhaps a public service announcement/review of fire physics will help future fire starters realize why hot things burn and to put out their fires like every girl/boy scout knows how.

When temperatures get sufficiently high for a material, something called pyrolysis takes place. This is where matter chemically decomposes through the action of heat. First, the combusting material starts emitting gasses such as water vapor. As the temperature increases, combustible gases start to ignite. Finally, when the temperature reaches a critical point we have ignition and the material burns.
So, to account for these chemical aspects, some geometry obsessed scientist added a fourth leg and called it the tetrahedron of fire. Combustion, aka fire, is actually a chemical chain reaction dependent on external factors. By using a dry chemical retardant like potassium or sodium bicarbonate (similar to a fire extinguisher), you can cut off the conditions necessary for combustion to occur. You can still have all the fire triangle elements present, but the fire is inhibited by stopping combustion.

How can you prevent fire? Ask Smokey, but basically he'll tell you the obvious. Don't leave combusting material lying next to other combustible material. Lightning and other natural causes of fire aren't as frequent or problematic as the cause of these-human apathy.
Check out this guy's blog for some incredible pictures of this fire.
Comments
Post a Comment