"Finding Accelerating Products": How the Gendarmerie Tracks Criminal Fires Through Science

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Cigarette butts, barbecues, matches... In France, nine out of ten fires are of human origin. Specialized gendarmes are charged with investigating to find their starting point.

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Under the cold light of the laboratory, Major Christophe Rémillon adjusts his white coat and put on his blue latex gloves before manipulating samples of calcined soil and charcoal, taken from the scene of a fire for analysis. On "a fire in natural space, this type of sampling is usually received: from the soil and residues of partially calcined plants or from residues of pieces of burnt wood", explains the major, expert in the forensic fire bran…