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halon fire extinguisher


avio@superherc
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Are Halon agents still in use????? Many of them were outlawed because of environmental issues. i can remember, back during my firefighting career, real concerns with them as far as health issues, too. One of the worst was Chlorobromomethane. Yep the same stuff that was used for the on-board fire sytems on the 130, at least back in my time .

Giz

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Halon was still bing used into the mid to late '90's.Don't know about after that.I retired in '95

>

That was just about the time they were being phased out in civilian usage. The big advantage of Halons, which were compounds made up of various combinations of Carbon, Chlorine, Bromine, and Flourine, if my memory serves, they extinguished by blocking the chemical chain reaction in the combustion process, but did not leave any residue, like dry chemical agents do, but they can be toxic by inhalation, and can exclude oxygen in enclosed areas. okay, Fire 101 is over for today....................

Giz

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Was halon the ingredients in those little brass fire extinguisher bottles that were on my planes in the late 60's and early 70's? I remember on Jan 1st. 1968 in Katum I stood by with one of those little farts while we started the GTC right on top of a lake of JP-4. I was thinking "yeh right" . No fire got started and I didn't have to use the extinguisher. Would it have done any good? I know I was planning on doing what NATOPS1 said!!!!

I'll never forget the good old days,

Ken

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Was halon the ingredients in those little brass fire extinguisher bottles that were on my planes in the late 60's and early 70's? I remember on Jan 1st. 1968 in Katum I stood by with one of those little farts while we started the GTC right on top of a lake of JP-4. I was thinking "yeh right" . No fire got started and I didn't have to use the extinguisher. Would it have done any good? I know I was planning on doing what NATOPS1 said!!!!

I'll never forget the good old days,

Those brass hand pumps contained carbon tetrachloride, which was an early halon agent. Same stuff was in those glass "fire grenades' that you occasionally see, that those dipshits on either Pickers or Pawn Stars said was water....This stuff was hateful, but very effective. It was widely used by the fire service until it became known that it was a hell of a carcinogen and a neurotoxin. It also was widely used as a cleaning agent in dry cleaning shops. And yes it would have been very effective to put out the initial fire, but like dry chemical agents, and CO2, it did not give protection against flashback, so there was the very real chance of the fuel, especially a flammable liquid ( where would that come from?) would reignite.

Sorry you asked?????????

load clear

Giz, former truckie and fire instructor

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1) Pull pin

2) Discharge Agent

3) Thorw bottle into fire

4) All the above while running away from aircraft....

The line Bottles are hard to throw...

You should insert nozzle into the panels on the side of the engine but you cannot reach them....

What I was talking about the large halon extinguishers kept on tarmac during engine start. Is it possible to reach the engine fire access panels with that flexible hose?

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Those shiney brass fire ex. were of the ethlene family, chobromomethlene or the triethelene both were designed to put you out rather than the fire.

Steve

You're right on both counts, Steve. I had a brainfart and mixed up the extinguishing agents. Non-aircraft types, often labelled as "Pyrene" had, usually, the carbon tet. Back in the 50's through the late 60's, early 70's, many brother firefighters got exposed to the crap released when this stuff contacted hot metal, and developed all kinds of disabling and fatal diseases. Of course, back in that time period, and even up into the early '80's, breathing apparatus wasn't mandatory. Miners used canaries to detect bad atmospheres, we firefighters used EACH OTHER!!!!!

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Giz,

I had worked with trichlorethelene as a cleaning solution but not for long. Very dangerous. By mistake I cleaned my power lawn mower air filter (sponge type) and didn't let it dry and installed it in the mower. Unknown to me when I started the mower clouds of white smoke developed, It was phosgene gas, I shut down the mower and ran.!!!

Steve

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Yep, Steve, that phogene gas is what comes off that stuff, carbon tet, also. If the general public had any idea of what is in the smoke from a house or vehicle, they would not believe it. These gases are all products of combustion and terribly dangerous. I often thought about the exposures guys had gotten from fighting aircraft fires, both on the ground, and in-flight with some of these agents. Bet quite a few of them had their lives shortened or made very miserable as a result.

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  • 2 weeks later...

My hat off to you and all your brother firefighters.!!

Steve

Thanks, Steve, I appreciate that very much. Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. I am one lucky SOB, too, because I have TWO sets of brothers, either set puts others before themselves, and forms a wall of protection for society against forces that want to destroy it..........

giz

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  • 2 weeks later...

Back in the C-141 days, prior to Halon, everyone used a ext agent called Purple K. It was effective for fire but VERY corrosive for the acft, hence the movement away from it to Halon. Well, Halon fell out of graces due to environmental concerns etc but we managed to keep it around for strictly flightline/on acft use (150# fire bottles/T handles etc). Even that is changing now...was told this week that the USAF Fire Chief has made a decision that we (USAF) will transition from Halon fire bottles on the flightline back to Purple K. Another example of one agency not talking to others to gleam potential detrimental effects of one's actions. Same thing happened in CE with hangar fire suppression systems. There was an established mil spec for the materials...CE didn't like it and migrated to a commercial product without telling anyone. It only came to light after a few accidental suppression discharge incidents when it came time for acft clean up.

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We have tech data on C-130's for use of Animal Protein agent. I'm not sure if that's what Purple K is, but we are required to clean every square inch within the QEC if the agent gets discharged in there. Halon has no cleanup requirements. If we go backwards, someone needs to be slapped.

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Purple K is a potassium based (hence the K) dry chemical agent particularly effective against hydro-carbon/petroleum type fires. It has/had a Class B rating, and was discharged from a pressurized extinguisher. Somehow, the idea got spread that it was for flammable metals, Class D fires. Nope, didn't work!!!!!!!! There was a similar agent, called Monex that did the same thing, but was extremely expensive when it came out. We cared them on the rigs I rode, and I do believe a person would have been fired had they used it. I remember one had something like a 1961 date of manufacture, and that was in '83 or so. And yep, these things were very corrosive. I don't know if the animal protein you mention is the old foam solutions or not. They were made of blood, fish guts, and who knows what else, and stunk like a SOB. Plus they only had about a seven year shelf life, and then just became a five gallon bucket of blood clots. AFFF and it's successors pretty much ended that crap. Tomorrow we will discuss Class A, C, D, and K fire classifications!!!!!! LMAO!!! Seriously, hope all you guys have an ABC dry chemical extinguisher and working smoke detectors in your house. You would not believe the injury, death and property damage that I have seen that these things could have reduced or prevented.....

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