A B C Fire Extinguisher Decontamination

[Forgotten Field]

I have already gotten advice on this but am looking on anybody's experience with cleaning up after ABC Fire Extinguisher discharge in proximity to airframe components.

[Brenden S]

ABC being a powder extinguisher?

[ZRX61]

It's very corrosive, it trashes race cars

[pjpahs]

Depends on the type of dry chemical used. Some are like bicarbonate of soda, and it has been used to pressure clean parts. You gotta know what the powder is.

[Forgotten Field]

I know it's corrosive. The chemical in question is Ammonium Phosphate. Again, if anybody has real experience decontaminating from this stuff, I'd like to hear.

[pjpahs]

Googled ,"cleaning ammonium phosphate" and it read to vacuum as much as you can, using respirator, goggles, rubber gloves and wash area down using 1 cup baking soda to 3 gallons water. I imagine you could use a pump up sprayer and cover the affected areas with the solution. Just what I read.

[tom d. friedman]

i had a ww2 japanese aircraft fire extinguisher, which was still 1/4 full. i shot the remainder of the liquid contents on my asphalt street & was shocked at how it marred the asphalt!! pretty heady stuff!!

[ZRX61]

i had a ww2 japanese aircraft fire extinguisher, which was still 1/4 full. i shot the remainder of the liquid contents on my asphalt street & was shocked at how it marred the asphalt!! pretty heady stuff!!

Carbon Tet?

[tom d. friedman]

no clue as to contents, can't read Japanese, but man did it eat up the asphalt!! I thought it wouldn't do anything to the pavement. what's real incredible is that the seller sent it to me via ups w/ no mention that it still had retardant in it. a big no no by any shipping company!!

[lbarber]

It's nasty stuff. I had an inadvertent discharge in my kitchen a couple of years ago, that was enough of a PITA to clean up. I would not want to be cleaning it out of an airplane.

Whatever you do, don't use water.

[Matt Gunsch]

as others have said, it is VERY corrosive, flush the area with lots and lots of water, if it gets into metal seams you have to get it all out. After you get everything cleaned up, take that dry chem and throw it as far as you can and get a Halon fire bottle, if it is for ramp use, look at Co2.
Dry chems should be banned anywhere near a plane.

[Forgotten Field]

Matt (and everybody else who ever had or will have to deal with this),

I agree about pre-planning with other extinguishers than ABC, but ABC is good to keep around for NOT-airplane fires due to its effectiveness and it's going to be around on every fire truck out there which might respond to little GA fields like where I call home. There is however, another step before you wash it- most ABC chemical dries out after it is discharged, and blowing it off with air gets a good bit of it gone. After you wet it, it runs everywhere. So washing it off after you have hit it with air was recommended to me and seems to have worked. That was per the fire extinguisher company, which by the way was the only 'authority' that I contacted that was any real help after the incident. Also, there are different grades and types of chemicals used in the ABC extinguishers. If they are around your airport, it's a good idea to keep an MSDS for them in your shop book, and in a shop book NOT IN YOUR SHOP in case something happens.

[Matt Gunsch]

to those that insist on keep a ABC, or BC dry chemical fire bottle around here is a maint tip, take them off the wall every once in a while and turn them upside down, you should feel the contents move around, if you don't, take a rubber mallet and tap the bottom to break up the chemical and get it back into a powder instead of clumps.

[Punisher05]

as others have said, it is VERY corrosive, flush the area with lots and lots of water, if it gets into metal seams you have to get it all out. After you get everything cleaned up, take that dry chem and throw it as far as you can and get a Halon fire bottle, if it is for ramp use, look at Co2.
Dry chems should be banned anywhere near a plane.

Strictly as FYI, since the stuff sounds like a real mess.

I'm not the expert, but I work with some...and the FAA mandates that we have at least 500 lbs of sodium-based dry chem or Halon, or 450 lbs of potassium-based dry chem on the ARFF trucks to use on airline crashes, as well as the AFFF for putting out hydrocarbon fires. I've always been told that those versions of dry chem are in place since they're less damaging to electrical components than shooting AFFF mixed with water into sensitive areas.

Then again---our priority is getting the hot stuff out so the people can escape. The only official interest we have in the cleanup afterward is preserving the scene and later getting it off my movement areas

-Brandon