How to demonstrate a forest fire to a class?
Hi I'm doing a project on forest fires, and I need to demonstrate to a class how they egnite, and burn/spread, without using real fire. Is there any way I could demonstrate this without actually burning something inside the classroom (thats against school policy).
It needs to show the three factors that a forest fire needs to be able to egnite:
1. heat
2. oxygen
3. fuel
Thanks alot for any suggestions.
Comments
Contact a local BLM or Forest Service station and see if they are doing any controlled burns you can take your class to see.
Otherwise, look around youtube for a video that may have been done.
Sounds more like a thought experiment. The biggest "doubt" would be the need for oxygen I imagine. Describe how fires are put out, which is usually by smothering to stop oxygen flow.
You could demonstrate it by only showing two things at a time:
Showing oxygen and fuel together with no heat is easy: the room is not on fire.
Showing oxygen and heat together could be done with a hot plate: The room still doesn't catch on fire when the hot plate is on.
The big one is showing heat and fuel together. If you take a large upside jar and fill it with helium, (you can get a canister at a good drugstore,) it will force the oxygen out of the jar. Keeping the jar upside down, and don't move you hand around too much, put a cigarette lighter in the jar and try to light it: it won't light. (Of course, I don't know how your school would feel about that demonstration because it involves a lighter, but you would be technically following the rules because nothing would actually burn.)
In my classroom a student generously simulated one as a surprise, i believe he stacked some papers on top of one another and lit them on fire