Foam Quality Effects on PFAS Free Foam Firefighting Capabilities: A Demonstration of the Link Between Foam Quality and Extinguishment Capabilities and What's Being Produced by DoD Hardware

Abstract

The leading, commercially available PFAS-Free Foams (PFFs) do not form a film like the legacy Aqueous Film-Forming Foams (AFFFs) and rely solely on the foam blanket as a mechanical means for smothering a liquid fuel fire. Most foam approval test standards/protocols (commercial and military) use air-aspirating discharge devices to apply foam to the fire to receive an approval/listing. The current military specification (Mil-Spec) for approving AFFF (MIL-PRF-24385F) uses an air-aspirating foam discharge nozzle during the fire performance approval tests and does not consider or try to replicate the foam quality that will be produced by the various fielded discharge devices. Neither does the draft land-based Mil-Spec currently under development. Since the new PFFs rely solely on the foam blanket to smother/extinguish the fire, foam quality will be a key consideration/parameter in actual applications that is being overlooked when considering these new PFFs as AFFF alternatives.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Apr 01, 2022
Accession Number
AD1217162

Entities

People

  • Jerry Back
  • John Farley

Organizations

  • United States Naval Research Laboratory

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Aircrafts
  • Alkanes
  • Alkenes
  • Demonstrations
  • Department Of Defense
  • Environmental Security
  • Fire Protection
  • Fire Suppression
  • Flow Rate
  • Measurement
  • Petroleum
  • Specifications
  • Sprinklers
  • Standards
  • Task Forces
  • Test Facilities
  • Vapor Pressure

Readers

  • Fire Suppression Systems Design.
  • Systems Analysis and Design