Types of fire

19 Aug

We are building a series of blogs to help you understand that complex-looking Fire preventions systems are not that complex.

So today we will start with the basics. We all are familiar with fire right we use it on a day-to-day basis for cooking, festivals, in some research labs, smoking, when we are doing a campfire on a holiday.

Did you know that out of all the examples I just gave there are 3 different fires that are classified based on the type of fuel?

Right about now you might be thinking why I should bother knowing about the types of fires. When extinguishing fires it is very crucial to understand what type of fire are we dealing with or else it would only cause the fire to grow more and there are specific ways to extinguish a certain type of fires.

Yes, so let us dig in a bit deep. For any fire to occur there must be 3 components the fuel, the air and the heat. If we arrange these 3 factors in a triangle that’s what the experts call a fire triangle.

So fires are basically classified into 5 types:

A, B, C, D and K class fires. Yes, it’s not E its K.

So, when a fire burns and leaves ashes or coal behind then it will be an A class fire. Some fuels that cause A class fires are Wood, Paper, trash, plastics.

When the fuel for the fire is flammable liquid or gases then it would be classified as B class fires. Examples for this would be Petrol, paint, gasoline or for gases Propane, Butane etc..

When the fire is caused due to electrical equipment like short circuits it would be classified as C class fires. These are very common and potentially more dangerous.

When the fuel for the fire is due to combustible metals like sodium, potassium, aluminium or magnesium then it would be classified as a D class fire.

And finally, we have K class fires that are caused when the fire starts from cooking oils or trans-fat. These are generally found in kitchens.

Now, lets look at ways to extinguish the fire.

And before that lets just do a quick revision

A class fire – wood, paper, plastic

B class fire – Flammable liquids or gases

C class fire – Electrical equipment

D class fire – Flammable metals

K class fire – Kitchen oil fires

And like I mentioned in an earlier blog, there are a certain Dos and Don’ts for each type of fire.

Type of Fire	DOS	DONTS
A CLASS	Use water, Dry sand
B CLASS	Foam Extinguisher, Dry chemical, CO2	Never use water
C CLASS	Dry sand, CO2	Don’t use water.
D CLASS	Dry sand, Dry Chemical
K CLASS	Wet chemical

That’s it for this blog everyone. If you have any Queries leave them in the comments sections. I know it’s a bit old but, you can mail them to info@basicelements.in