There are fire extinguisher bottles in the engines, apu and cargo compartments of the aircraft to prevent a possible fire. In addition to having too many fuel and hydraulic fluid lines on the engines, the fact that they are mounted on the wings with the fuel tank means that a fire which has started in the engine will spread to the wings if not prevented. Therefore, fire extinguishers are very important for flight safety.
Halon gas is used in these fire tubes and there are two types of halon gas. Halon 1211 type is used only in portable fire bottles, and halon 1301 in fixed fire bottles.
One of the biggest and most efficient properties of Halon gas is that it is not conductive, besides it chemically interrupts the ”fire triangle” (flammable material, oxygen, heat) and extinguishes . If halon is used, it does not contaminate any residue in the environment and does not cause secondary damage caused by residues.
As for how halon works; When a non-reactive gas is added to a flammable gas, a temperature drop occurs because the heat released by the reaction of oxygen molecules with a fuel source must be dissipated into the environment.
The rate of flammable chemical reaction decreases rapidly with decreases in temperature, and if the concentration of the added inert gas is high enough, the flame chemistry will fail completely.
Finally, breathing is very harmful when working with a halon and must follow the instructions for protection. In addition, you can check our article for another system NGS that used to prevent fire in the aircraft.
