Classification of petroleum-based accelerants in fire debris using gas-chromatography mass spectrometry and chemometric technique

Abstract

The classification of petroleum-based accelerants in fire debris samples have been studied using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GCMS) and chemometric technique. Samples were collected from carpets burnt with three different types of accelerants: gasoline, kerosene and diesel. Some of the charred carpets were left for several days to study effect weathering on the classification. Total ion chromatograms obtained for each sample were subjected to principal component analysis (PCA). The chromatograms identified the hydrocarbons present in the samples while PCA perform the classification based on the peak area of each component. This study showed that, by using PCA, we were able to cluster the samples according to type of accelerants used even though some of the samples were collected several days after the incident.