Date: Fri, 7 Apr 2006 18:06:42 -0400
Reply-To: -------------------- <VW4X4@VERIZON.NET>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: -------------------- <VW4X4@VERIZON.NET>
Subject: Re: VLC Fry-day: Putting out fires
In-Reply-To: <877B2949-5B5D-4D16-A7EF-DC6C4C025B81@knology.net>
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JIm,
Obviously the cause of the fire, (probably a shorted battery cable)
was still causing fires.
I've had to use fire extinguishers on 4 occasions. Two were
on gas pouring out of there fuel tanks. Without any further
ignition these fire went out with one very small burst from the
extinguisher.
Jim Felder wrote:
> Yesterday I rolled up to the first spot in the right lane of a busy
> intersection near the interstate. I was in my westy. I saw a guy get
> out of a huge seventies sled that had died in traffic and stick a
> cell phone to his ear and walk through busy traffic to a gas station
> nearby. Unbeknownst to him, the car, which had been smoking lighly
> from under the hood, started smoking a lot and dropping what looked
> like burning chunks of plastic or rubber onto the road beneath the
> engine compartment. The thing was thirty feet away. Black smoke was
> really billowing a few seconds later. I pulled my westy onto a
> concrete turn island and ran out the side door with the fire
> extinguisher. The wind was so high that I had to get nearly behind
> the car to make the spray hit the fire. By the time I got the aim
> right in the high winds, the fire extinquisher was nearly out. I was
> standing hear the gas tank, where I didn't want to be, and the fire
> was out, and the burnt wired shorted and the car tried to start
> itself again, so I ran back to the westy and climbed in and waited
> for the light to change. And waited and waited. The fire started up
> again. I waited and waited. I was afraid that all the surrounding
> cars and mine too would be blown to smithereens when the gas tank
> lit.It puts a different perspective on waiting when you think by
> staying you could get killed or burned, it's not like waiting in line
> at the store behind someone who has an envelope full of coupons and a
> bunch of stuff that won't scan. I waited and waited and waited some
> more. I wanted to run the light but there was too much traffic.
> Nobody else had a fire extinguisher, though a few had gotten out of
> their cars but were afraid to get close. I waited and waited and
> then the light turned green and I shot out of there like a slug out
> of hell (it's a diesel).
> .
>
> The moral of the story: one extinguisher won't do it, and nobody else
> has one, so carry two.
>
> Jim
>
>
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