ARE ALL WILDLAND FIRE SHELTERS SUITABLE FOR PROTECTING FIRE FIGHTERS?

摘要

An investigatinn was undertanken of fire shelters used by wildland fire fighters in a specific in,dent. On July 10, 2001, a severe wildland fire occurred in Washington State and four fire fightors losttheir lives, in spite of having followed standard procedures in deploying the sheltors they were provided by US Forst Service. The remains of three of the fire fighters were found to have been severely burned and their shelers mostly destroyed. The body of the fourth rite fightor was found inside a relatively intact shelter, having suffered relatively small amount of burns. Sections of an exemplar five shelter similar to the one used by the latter fire fighter were heatodin closed ovens, followed by mass loss determinationsand FTIR analysis of the off-gases. It was found that heating this exemplar fire shelter to relatively low temperatures was sufficient to cause generation of a large enough mass of combustible off-gases thatincapacitation, and probably also lethality, was likely. This work discusses the investigation and makesrecommendations.