Recently, I’ve blogged about incinerators and the big global solutions of burning municipal materials and reducing landfills.
But there’s another side to my business. We also manufacture and maintain crematorium incinerators. Working alongside both human and animal funeral directors, ensuring that equipment is working at the highest standards.
Today’s blog is a little morbid and although we never really ever want to discourage our followers and readers, this is the 15-warning symbol to say it’s a little dark!
Cremation or incineration, what’s the difference?
This is a valid question, given that both words mean the same thing: to reduce to ash. However, where incineration burns waste, detritus and objects, cremation reduces the body of a loved one to ashes, according to their last wishes. That’s a significant difference! It’s thus preferable and more respectful to say that a body is being cremated rather than incinerated.
During cremation, the body, placed in a coffin or rigid cardboard container, is reduced to ashes in a specialized oven at over 700 degrees Celsius.
Before proceeding with a cremation, some verifications are made. The crematorium operator makes sure that they have the right body, as it is uniquely identified throughout the entire body transportation process. The employee then reads the death record and the cremation form signed by the responsible person. The body is placed on a hydraulic table, then on a conveyor, often manually operated, which will then safely bring it into the cremation chamber.
When the cremation process has finished, small amounts of bone will remain, these are taken from the cremator, cooled and placed in a machine which reduces the bone to ashes. These are the ashes which are put into a container. After the cremation, the family may choose to receive the ashes of their loved one.
Cremations last between one and three hours with cooling taking a further one or two hours. This depends on cremation temperatures, the size of the deceased, and coffin material.
Most crematoriums are able to return a loved one’s ashes one working day after the cremation, and sometimes even on the same day, depending on the time of the cremation process.
So, although the process of cremation for any loved one (human or animal) involves a deep sympathy and grievance, there’s still a lot of work and dedication that goes into those chambers, the heat recovery boiler and the flue gas plant.
Please get in touch with our industry professionals at enquiries@mscombustion.com or +44(0)7786 214039 to discuss your #incineration and #cremation needs.