Why Immediate Remediation of Smoke and Soot Damage after a Fire Accident is Important

Did you know that the first ever occupational link to cancer was discovered in 1775, when the English surgeon Percivall Pott determined that exposure to chimney soot often resulted in chimney sweeps developing what was known as “soot wart”? Chimney sweeps were boys, who went up chimneys to dislodge the soot that has accumulated inside. Many of them worked as apprentices for master sweeps, and they often went up chimneys in the nude. The disease they developed wasn’t just any ordinary wart, of course, because it was something more insidious: a form of carcinoma of the skin of the scrotum, which debilitated and killed many of the young men who were affected.

Smoke and soot is bad for people’s health, and more so if these byproducts of combustion are inhaled. In fact, at present, smoke inhalation is the primary cause of civilian death in fire accidents in the United States. It causes serious life-threatening respiratory system injuries, and it can also result in long-term damage to the lungs.

As mentioned, smoke and soot are created from the process of combustion. Although the resulting composition of the byproduct after the burning process depends on a number of things, including the kind of materials that were burned, the amount of oxygen in the air when the fire occurred, and the temperature at which the fire burned, smoke tends to be composed of various types of  particulate matter and gases. Soot is usually defined as the impure carbon byproducts that result from the partial combustion of hydrocarbons, which end up being mixed with smoke.

On top of their ill effects on health, smoke and soot can also seriously damage properties. Exposure to the acidity and chemical content of smoke and soot can harm your home’s contents, so if you think that the damage stops after the fire is extinguished, you better think again.

If you live in Palm Beach County, Miami-Dade County, and Broward County in South Florida, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with All County DKI’s team of experts by calling 888-616-6811. We will be more than happy to help you get rid of the smoke and soot that have been left behind by the fire accident in your home, and we’ll even help you deal with the water damage from the extinguishing process. We are also experts when it comes to contents restoration, so we’ll also help you restore all items that can still be saved from your damaged belongings.