The Effect of Air Gap and Moisture for the Skin Burn Injury of the Firefighter’s Personal Protective Clothing (PPC)

Abstract

Fire fighters are commonly exposed to intense heat and fire. They suppressed fire by spraying water to avoid flame from spreading. They are enforced to use the Personal Protective Clothing (PPC) made of the flame-retardant material to protect themselves from the skin burn injury. Skin burn injury is the most common injury occurs among them. Yet, the exposure to extreme heat and moisture absorption into the clothing layers caused severe burn injury formation. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of air gap combined with the moisture absorption in the fabrics using Finite Element Method (FEM) and the Bio heat Equation. From the simulation experiment it is discovered the air gap is a good insulator capable of preventing skin burn with a skin temperature of 48°C. However, the presence of moisture strongly affects skin temperature. It had elevated to 59.64°C forming a second-degree type burn injury. The presence of moisture had weakened thermal protection of the flame-retardant material and the air gap against the heat flux. It is found the moist material properties had enhanced heat transfer from the heat flux to the skin surface resulting severe skin burn despite they were encapsulated with the Personal Protective Clothing (PPC).