Nowadays, if you aren’t in the fire service or celebrating your 30th b-day for the 30th time, you probably aren’t even familiar with a cartridge style extinguisher! These larger-than-life extinguishers are just as effective and, in some cases, more so than the oh-so-familiar stored pressure units you walked by each day. Believe it or not, these behemoths used to be the go-to extinguishers- so why is it that so many of us can’t even picture one?
Cartridge type extinguishers are the OG fire extinguisher. While they were around for decades, it wasn’t until the revolution of dry chemical or ABC in the 1960’s when they really took off! Unlike most of the extinguishers we see today, cartridge style extinguishers hold their extinguishing agent and their expelling agent separately. This means that in order to use a cartridge style extinguisher you, the user, must force a chemical reaction which also means there’s a few more steps involved:
Step 1: Pull the Pin– this “unlocks” the extinguisher and readies it for use.
Step 2: Push the Button or Pull the Lever– this punctures the cartridge which pressurizes the cylinder.
Step 3: Squeeze and Aim– as usual, you can now squeeze the handle, aim at the base, and put that fire out!
That doesn’t seem too awful hard- just one additional step. So, why exactly are these extinguishers near obsolete? Well, even though it may not seem that hard… it is. Most people aren’t familiar with cartridge extinguishers and thus they do NOT know about that Step 2 which, in a real fire scenario, doesn’t end well. Because most people don’t know about cartridge extinguishers most people, including your safety honchos, don’t think to have folks trained on them- compounding the first issue. Lastly, cartridge style extinguishers are BIG. They are bulky and awkward making them very difficult to many people to operate effectively. So, while the extinguishers themselves may be top-notch fire putter outers we are no longer very good with them- which has led them to near extinction now.
You will still these monstrous extinguishers around for a while yet. Although, we will note that the only customers we still see actively using cartridge style extinguishers are fire departments. And, sadly, when we inquire about whether or not they are prepared to use them the answer is usually that they don’t know how. So, if many of our firefighters can’t themselves use cartridge extinguisher how could we, in good conscience, recommend these to the general public? We can’t and, so, we don’t! The cartridge style extinguisher has done its duty, provided a wonderful service to us all for a long time but, sadly, its time is coming to a close. If you weren’t familiar with these extinguishers before, then thanks for learning a bit about these faithful servants before they go completely extinct.
