What is Carbon Monoxide and Hydrogen Cyanide?
Carbon monoxide is an odourless, highly poisonous gas with a STEL of 100ppm. In low concentrations, it can cause mild CO poisoning, making personnel nauseous, dizzy and with shortness of breath. Whereas High concentrations can cause heart attacks, seizures and death. HCN is known to be 35 times more poisonous than CO, with a STEL of 4.7ppm. It’s a colourless gas, with a smell similar to almonds. Both gases bind to blood haemoglobin in the body, preventing the transport of O2. This can cause reactions such as a loss of consciousness and death in high concentrations.
In their own right, these gases are dangerous individually. However, exposure to both together is even more dangerous, so an adequate CO and HCN gas detector is essential where the toxic twins are found.
But how do I know what CO and HCN gas detector is best for the toxic twins? Not to worry, our article below discusses this in depth, helping you in understanding the dangers of HCN and CO, where these twins are found and the ideal monitoring solution.
Where are the Toxic Twins Found and What are the Dangers?
Together, they are found primarily in fires. Commonly, firefighters and personnel are trained to look out for CO poisoning in fires. However, due to the increased use of plastics and man made fibres, HCN can be released at up to 200ppm in domestic and industrial fires. These two gases cause thousands of fire related deaths annually, so needs more consideration in fire gas detection. The POLI CO and HCN gas detector is commonly used by firefighters to monitor for these gases when travelling in and out of smoke engulfed buildings.
As previously mentioned, these gases as a pair are more dangerous than when individually encountered. The toxic twins, as they are known in the fire industry, form a chemical asphyxiant together. With both CO and HCN preventing oxygen from reaching vital organs, and HCN causing heart attacks if inhaled and long terms effects like cancer. CO and HCN can also cause effects such as headache, chest tightening, disorientation and burns around the mouth and nose.
So it is vital to have a competent monitor in place to detect for this deadly duo in environments where it is possible for them both to be present. IGD offer a range of CO and HCN gas detector solutions, backed by our 100 years of expertise in gas detection. The mPower POLI is the perfect device for dealing with the toxic twins in a firefighting application.
IGD’s Portable CO and HCN Gas Detector Solutions
Our collaboration with Mpower allows us to offer you the easy-to-use POLI multi gas detector. This CO and HCN gas detector is customisable to your needs. The platform offers a wide range of plug-and-play sensors in particular CO and HCN for this application along with Oxygen depletion and flammables on one portable. This makes the POLI ideal for firefighter safety applications. Sensor types can be easily swapped using smart sensor technology. For firefighters this means the unit can be switched from a personal protection device to one used for forensic examination post fire.
With a long battery life and durable outer case, the POLI CO+HCN gas detector is ideal for use in fire safety. Features include, long battery life, a unique man down alarm, 360 LED alarm bar, sounder and vibration alarms. There are also wireless options to link units to a master controller, perfect for Hazmat and similar operation.
The POLI HCN gas detector offers up to 6 months continuous data logging and a 16 hour rechargeable battery. You can rely on the POLI to keep track of a large array of events on a long life battery. This device is also easily rechargeable through a micro USB, so it can be recharged from a vehicle easily if needed. The long life battery and lengthy event logging thus makes it the ideal CO and HCN gas detector for firefighting applications, offering long life, easily reportable detection. With POLI you always have the right detector.
Your Experts in Gas Detection – Contact Us Today
IGD can offer initial consultancy, design, and installation of detectably better gas detection. We offer calibration and maintenance on both our own HCN gas detectors, and those developed by our partner companies. Our team has extensive knowledge and experience in the gas detection industry, contact the team for more advice on your gas detection needs or to request a demo.
