Mobile Sampling System to Resolve Firefighter Team Exposures to Volatile Organic Compounds

Carcinogenic volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from wildfires and wildland urban interface (WUI) fires pose significant health risks to firefighters. Yet, limited information is known about the specific chemical composition of smoke exposure which is needed to develop targeted cancer prevention protocols. Critically, current methods to monitor firefighters' exposure to these hazardous VOCs are lacking. To address this gap, we developed an automated portable air sampling device capable of identifying and quantifying firefighters' exposure to toxic VOCs over a 24-hour work period. The device can be mounted to the pump panel on a fire engine with a sheet metal cradle to travel with firefighters as they work or can be mounted on tripods during live fire trainings. Our sampler actively collects air samples through a pump system and concentrates up to four individual air samples onto one of four custom micro-pre-concentrator (µPC) chemical adsorption chips. Additionally, the device has a simple user interface and records temperature, humidity, and global positioning sensor (GPS) location data on an SD card during sampling. Ten devices were manufactured and verified to capture environmental VOCs in equal quantities and be robust under the high temperatures and heavy vibrations that a fire engine experiences. Devices were deployed by a partner fire department during a 2024 California wildfire. We present successful collection of environmental and chemical data sampled during that fire.