Development of a Headspace Sampling−Gas Chromatography−Mass Spectrometry Method for the Analysis of Fireground Contaminants on Firefighter Turnout Materials

摘要

Firefighting is classified as a 2B-possibly carcinogenicprofession by the International Agency for Research onCancer (IARC). Firefighters are exposed to a host of toxicfireground contaminants such as phenols, phthalates, andpolycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), many of which arepotentially carcinogenic. Studies show that the exposure tocontaminated firefighter gear postfire poses a health risk to thefirefighters. This study focused on the issue of contaminants beingpresent on the gear and developing a thermal extraction method toperform the assessment. A headspace sampler (HS) connected to agas chromatography−mass spectrometry (GC−MS) system wasused to thermally extract known fireground contaminants andunderstand the effect of equilibration time and temperature on thethermal extraction efficiencies. The outer shell fabric samples (PBI/Kevlar blend) were spiked with known amounts of firegroundchemicals, heated at various temperatures (36, 50, 100, and 200 °C), and analyzed using the developed method to calculateextraction efficiencies. This study is one of the first to utilize the all-in-one HS−GC−MS instrument to analyze the thermalextraction of a variety of fireground contaminants relative to different temperatures from firefighter gear materials. Based on theconditions evaluated, the results indicate that the 200 °C condition allowed for the maximum thermal extraction of contaminantsfrom the outer shell material. The data collected from this study pave a way of creating a new method for the analysis of volatile andsemivolatile contaminants from field-contaminated firefighter turnout material using HS−GC−MS.