Fire accidents can occur anytime and anywhere and these accidents can be deadly. To avoid such incidents, you need to keep a fire extinguisher in a home, office, or in the factory. However, you should bear in mind that one type of fire extinguisher won’t be able to douse every fire.

Each fire extinguisher is manufactured to extinguish a specific class of fire. The class of fire usually depends on what is burning. Some fires might involve cooking fats, others might involve fuels or gases, others might be burning solids like fabrics or paper. And because all of these fires burn in different ways, they need different types of extinguishers to control and put them out.

There are five main types of fire extinguisher

• Water*
• Dry powder
• Foam
• Carbon dioxide (CO2)
• Wet chemical

* Water fire extinguishers come in two different types: water spray and water mist

Colors Codes For Fire Extinguishers

Water-Fire Extinguishers -  These extinguishers comes in solid red color. ‘Water’ or ‘Watermist’ are always written in white color within the red label. These extinguishers create a cooling effect by penetrating the burning materials and preventing reignition.

Powder Fire Extinguishers - This fire extinguisher comes with a blue label. ‘Powder’ is always written in white within the blue label.

Foam Fire Extinguishers - This type of extinguisher comes with a cream (Lemon Yellow) label on the red body. You can identify this extinguisher through words ‘Foam’ written in red on the cream colored label.

Carbon Dioxide Fire Extinguishers - This type of fire extinguisher comes with a black label on the red body. You will have ‘Carbon Dioxide’ or CO2 written in white on a black label.

Wet Chemical Fire Extinguishers - You can easily identify this type of fire extinguisher from the words ‘Wet Chemical’ written inside a yellow label with a red body. Wet Chemical extinguishers can be used to douse class F fire also known as Kitchen Fire Extinguishers.