to 1200 degrees fahrenheit, it s got enough energy to ignite everything below it. every exposed surface catches on fire. the aftermath of a fire like this will often leave behind irregular burn patterns on the floor of a structure, much like the ones investigators found in the willis fire. you will find patterns in the room that look like you would imagine a floor and lower walls would look if they had been exposed to the fire from a liquid accelerant such as gasoline which had been poured. this phenomenon is known as flashover. it is called flashover because the fire gets so hot that it literally rolls over engulfing the entire room in flames. this is the moment that flashover occurs. flashover produces patterns that cannot be discerned from those produced by liquid accelerants except that flashover does a better job than
a liquid accelerant does. people have said, oh, the whole house caught fire from one end to the other in under five minutes. somebody must have poured gasoline. it s not true. you flash over one room and very quickly your house is involved. flashover could also explain the furniture being consumed. following a post flashover fire, what you expect to see is tables, chairs, couches, all of it reduced to charcoal. it is very common for fire investigators to work on the premise that the fire was too hot or too fast to be a natural fire. in other words, the idea that only an accelerant can generate enough heat to destroy a heavy dining room table. but as this other fire investigation experiment shows,
virginia. what are they likely to send there? and what kinds of testing will they do on it? well, all of the material that was taken to the bomb range, for example, would be gathered back up, the up to the destroyed portions of those bombs, canisters, things of that nature. would be taken to the lab and they will do analysis there and-to-determine what types of powder weroused, what type of explosives were used. the incendiary materials that there s liquid accelerant, things like that, samples to those would be taken to the lab to be tested. and, of course, virtually everything else in that apartment ranging from computers to paper items and to hairs and fibers and even finger prunts are likely to be taken from that hadn t and sent to the laboratory for analysis. one of the things that was reported today, that his computer was inside that apartment. what kinds of things will they be looking for? certainly they are going to
evidence is in there may have clues that would lead investigators to, perhaps a n on site location where they would be secured. there s so much more in there. i understand that there are about some 30 canisters of possibly explosives powder looks being like black 16 inch softballs some were rubber coating and other containers with liquid accelerant and black powder one of the officers there on the ground described as, if you had this, it looks like guinness poured into a half and half, black and tan. clearly sophisticated and i would like you to tell us, to walk us there if you re there, what sort of challenges there are and how extremely difficult it is. and there has been success so far, thankfully, but this is far from over and far from an easy task at this point? well, the bomb experts are
the victims. heartbreaking stories from their families are hitting home with all of us. we ll share some of those stories throughout the morning. let s get right to our poppy harleararlo harlow, though. she is at holmes apartment, at that apartment complex for us this morning. poppy, what is the activity taking place there this hour? reporter: good morning, randi. it s really picking up. what you see behind me, if you can make out those busted windows on the third floor of that complex, that is james holmes apartment on the third floor. i want to play you some video now that we just shot. what i can tell you is that the denver bomb squad has arrived in the past half hour. the arapahoe county bomb squad, as well as the adams county bomb squad, all local here around denver, just arrived, as well as atf. i just spoke with one of the atf members. we re going to the try to get someone on camera right after this. they have just arrived as well, so they re preparing to assess th