– How exactly does water put out a fire? Is it a smothering thing, or a chemical reaction?

Question

– How exactly does water put out a fire? Is it a smothering thing, or a chemical reaction?

In: Chemistry

Answer 1

Water both cools and smothers a fire depending on how you apply it. If saturated or sprayed in a heavy fog pattern it will cool the fire by removing heat both latent (liquid to steam) and sensible (cold water to hot water) by doing this it removes energy from the fire . Going from liquid to steam takes a lot of energy. It can smother a fire as well when going from liquid to steam water can expand by about 1600 times in volume this will displace the air in the space and break the fire triangle (air,heat fuel).