Explosives Safety - Thermal Hazards

Thermal Hazards

Generally, thermal hazards from explosives events are of less concern than blast and fragment hazards. With the release of energy from an explosion is heat. The amount of heat varies with the energetic compound (explosive). All explosives compound molecules are potentially unstable held together with weak bonds in their outer shell. When this weak bond is broken heat and energy is violently released. It normally takes longer for the thermal blast to incur. Injury from thermal effects follows the blast and fragmentation effects which happen almost instantaneously. This does not imply that there is a time lapse between blast and fragmentation effects of explosives; in fact it happens so fast that humans cannot notice the delay without specialized equipment. The time available to react to a thermal event does increases survivability by rapid equipment designed to react in a fragment of a second. The primary effect of the thermal effect from an explosive detonation on structures, material, and ammunition and explosives (A&E) is their partial or total destruction by fire. The primary concern for explosives safety with a fire involving A&E is that it may transition to a more severe reaction, causing detonations of additional or more hazardous explosives devises and placing more people or property at a greater degree of risk of damage, destruction, injury, or death.