Once a battery off-gasses and releases vapor, failure is imminent. As the rate of off-gassing increases and smoke begins to appear, tactics must shift from mitigation to operational safety and containment.

In these complex situations, personnel safety must be your first priority. Consider the potential for ignition and explosion, and establish defensive operations as the incident progresses from off-gassing (Stage 2) to smoke generation (Stage 3). Once off-gassing occurs, the batteries are already destroyed, so prioritize containment and exposure protection.

Conventional gas detection such as multi-gas meters will not provide you with sufficient warning to de-escalate an incident. By the time the meter detects the event, the volume of gas is already too high to de-escalate the situation. Specialty detection for early warning is currently under development.