Smoke hoods etc

Black Club - July 17, 2023

I’ve got a few of the smoke hood type escape devices (I have one in my travel bag)

looking to change to these:

Home

have ordered one to see how bulky it is in comparison to

Smoke Hood and Fire Mask Products

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First time I’ve heard of this. Sounds like a great idea for anyone who spends a lot of time on the 3rd story or higher of a building.

Air For Life uses a self-contained oxygen supply, so that should be much more effective while it lasts.

The others are filters that will help with the damaging particles but not the carbon monoxide or lack of oxygen. When they say those are good for 15 minutes, I think they mean that you start taking damage immediately but they can give you some extra minutes before you pass out.

Filters are more than adequate for smoke from distant fires, which is mostly particles. But a house on fire fills with gases that a filter can’t block.

 

This has arrived

ill take some photos and do a quick review over the weekend

 

I bought a few of these because they were so cheap.  Haven’t tried them yet.

Fire Evacuation Mask

 

I have a couple of the AVON smoke hoods.  They are not cheap, but I got them through work as I often have to stay in, shall we say less than 5 star hotel’s.   

The only concern I have with the O2 system is it is only 22Lt’s.  The small CD Cylinder’s we use on the Ambulance hold 460Lt’s.  

 

Typical breathing rate is about 6 liters per minute (0.5 liters per breath, 12 breaths per minute). So a 22 liter tank should be good for around 4 minutes. Maybe half that if breathing faster due to stress. Should be good enough for a 2nd floor evacuation but not for a 10th floor evacuation. Anyone planning to use this should practice walking slowly out of the building, as though slowed down by a crowd, and counting how many breaths they need.

 

This is useful to know. I live on the 20th floor so will need to think about a system.

 

Follow up:

 

Size comparrison.

As you can see the Air for life system is a fair bit bigger, but you would expect that as it has a cylinder.

 

Here is the opening and wearing of the Fire Mask:

Fairly straightforward, package opened easily. Not so easy to get a seal around the neck. Plus the visor fogged up almost immediately, and thats with no excertion.

Would give you some heat protection for the head.

Plus the “lifespan” of these is not great, thats why I opened this one, it was out of date

Price on amazon is about £40 GB pounds with around a two year expiry

 

Air For Life https://airforlife.org.uk/shop/

plus there is a kit with mask, cylume etc

https://www.beeswift.co.uk/web/uk/webitem.html?Item=CM1991&ItemNo=CM1991

Top of cylinder has a small plastic cap (with keeps falling off) to prevent accidental release of the o2)

I used some orange tape to keep it in place.

Also the holster in yellow is extra

out of the box the cylinder is a lot smaller, and compact. Not sure how to store the mask safely this way though

I also got some fireproof gloves and goggles. Could do with a cylume and maybe some form of head protection similar to in the kit.

Any ideas of how to store the mask safely when its not in the box/tube???