Ensuring firefighter safety and resource preservation from contamination in demolition building fires

Abstract

Research characteristics and define toxic substances that remain in emergency clothing after fires in abandoned and demolition buildings. As a basic component of the integrated rescue system, members of the Fire and Rescue Service may be primarily or secondarily exposed to the effects of dangerous substances that penetrate the body as part of intervention activities. Personal protective equipment (PPE) used by firefighters can be characterized as a potential source of hazardous exposure to toxic contaminants commonly found and released during fires. The research task was to detect these contaminants in individual samples based on gas chromatography (GC) and subsequently to determine the decontamination methods of firefighters and PPE after an intervention. Based on a real intervention in an abandoned and demolished building where there was a fire, firefighters from individual fire stations intervened, where, as stated in the research, they intervened in the mentioned protective equipment. The amount of dangerous substances was determined based on gas chromatography in the Control and Chemical Laboratory of the Ministry of the Interior in the village of Jasov. The stated procedure was used to determine the amount of residual hazardous substances on emergency clothing and the procedures for possible elimination of the hazard.