How do firefighters (or investigators idk) find the cause of a fire? Isn’t that super hard if everything is just ash and dust?
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I actually did some lab work relating to flammable compounds found in arson cases, and from just the vapor found in the air, I could pick out different hydrocarbons and trace them back to a few sources with alarming accuracy.
The eli5 of it is: anything that burns very rarely burns completely. With sensitive enough equipment, I could find the “fingerprint” of different chemicals that can be used to start fires. Based on some concentrations and other fun factors, you can narrow down location. It’s really neat stuff.
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