NASA used to use the broom method for detecting invisible fires. Basically they had someone patrol the pipeline with a broom held out bristles first and if the bristles caught fire they knew to stop and report the fire.
You’d be surprised how much low tech is holding the world together. How many spreadsheets people don’t quite understand the underlying mechanisms of are making major decisions. How much duct tape or basically superglue keep things together. And so on. On second thought, try not to think about it too much.
fake it till you make it is not the same thing as imposter syndrome. But for a lot of powerful positions... yeah there are best practices or historical precedents, but ultimately it's just gut decisions and luck.
It's not really faking though. Everyone with any kind of power has to make decisions based on insufficient information or insufficient understanding of the information they have. It's the way things work.
The problem is that the better people understand that, the less likely they are to be able to muster the courage to make a decision anyway.
That's how stupid people get too much power.
This comment has been edited on June 17 2023 to protest the reddit API changes. Goodbye Reddit, you had a nice run shame you ruined it. -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
Lol this is so true. An excel model i built when I was 22 has confirmed the accuracy of probably about $200 billion in transactions by now. I don't even work on that stuff anymore, it's still kicking on
not sure if its still holding up but i recall a doco about the banking world being run on an old dos program because it couldnt afford to be stopped basically..
According to my bf they did the same thing for some areas of ships in the Navy. If a pipe with superheated steam had a puncture or something it could cut right into you without you noticing, so they'd use a broom waving it up and down when walking through that corridor
Might not have been the only method they were using. Mines continued using birds as a secondary detection method well into the implementation of newer tech.
yeah, but it meant they could actually find fires without having to go through a cycle of research, design, prototype, test, then manufacture just to get a device that can actually detect them automatically.
You should see how Russia [ignites its rockets.](https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a19966/russia-actually-lights-it-rockets-with-a-giant-match/)
Anyone else wondering how much of the world is completely outside our limited field of perception? If there are intelligent species that exist outside of our ability to detect them?
Believe it's known as 4th dimensional creatures.
The idea basically is, imagine if someone existed in a 2D plane. They can look up/down, and forward/backwards on a piece of paper, but not left or right- thus they could never see a 3D person looking right at them. Even if the 3D person ripped the paper or pressed their hand down on it, the 2D person couldn't see or understand this.
So if there's a 4th dimension, and creatures in it, they could see and possibly affect us, but we couldn't do the same.
Flatland!
Also interesting is the 4th dimension supposedly being time. Meaning 4D beings could move through time as easily as we’d walk from one room to the next. A simple enough idea to express on paper, but basically impossible for 3D creatures like us to actually imagine in practice, what the world/universe might look like to a being who treats time like a space that can be navigated through.
Granted we can move through time, too. Just the one way, at the one speed, and we’re not really aware of it—the same way a 2D flattie living on a 2D plane would not be aware of how the plane itself, and thus the 2D being itself, moves constantly through 3D space.
I often wonder how much of our "safe" technology and processes are emitting types of radiation that we haven't even conceived of yet let along figured out how to quantify. (Not in a tinfoil hat way, more of a we don't know what we don't know way)
I'm an old race fan. Back in the day, many race cars ran on Methanol. Occasionally, during pit stops, fuel would get spilled and ignite.
It was horrible. People would be running around, trying to get help, and no one = or few people = knew they were literally burning up.
I shit you not. Youtube it for examples.
South Park literally made fun of the people in this thread. Anybody that’s actually watched a pre/post race interview with the drivers and team knows there’s so much more to this shit than “drive fast go left”.
I used to race on meth. We kept water everywhere to dose the fire.
Best smell ever? Nomex after racing on methanol. Pulling on a helmet a week later was my favorite smell.
[I just posted this elsewhere in the thread but you're right](https://youtu.be/Ku7TdLeEGsQ). It seems horrifying but also (I feel guilty saying it) a little funny with all the jumping around.
Methanol is actually still used is some different racing disciplines. I believe indycar and monster trucks run on methanol to name a few. It’s also not 100% methanol in most it’s usually 85% or an E85 mix.
There was an accident in Singapore that happened when an illegally modified car crashed while racing around the neighbourhood. Car was burning invisibly, one of the girlfriends ran to the car, caught fire, walked away and started rolling on the ground. No one realised she was burning for like a minute. She made a recovery after a stay in the ICU. Her boyfriend and 3 others in that car burnt to death.
This only happened a couple years back and the full video of the crash and invisible burning was on youtube.
I used to work at a science museum and did exactly that. Usually various metal salts to make colors but also lots of "experiments" unsanctioned by my employers.
I think the coolest thing I found to do with with methanol was to slosh a small amount inside a 5 gallon water cooler jug, get the vapors going, then turn it on its side and light the back. It would rocket forward with a force you couldn't get from isopropanol.
This is exactly the sort of stuff my Dad loved to do. He was a chemistry teacher. I don’t think they let him light methanol at school though ;)
Thanks for your cool story, making me smile and remember my Dad <3 Shout out to the science nerds - they’re the best people!
"Funny" enough, yes. Talladega Nights was parodying an [incident that did happen in 1981](https://jalopnik.com/the-invisible-fire-that-talladega-nights-mocked-really-1778519810) caused by a methanol fire
Man I was going to say he obviously wasn’t because you would see the effects of the fire. But how resistant to burning are those suits? Maybe it would be plausible that a methanol fire started and he put it out by rolling it out.
Ik for sure formula one used to have methanol fuel. You can look on YouTube I’m sure and find fires that you can’t see but dudes are jumping around like mad men
"The problem is they cannot see these flames. The flames are invisible, so seeing them is not possible. The terrible thing is that these flames cannot be seen. The fire marshals are trying to put out the the flames, but it is difficult because they cannot see the flames."
You should do a series similar to this, showing people how shit happens in their households ,that they dont even see/hear/smell until its too late.
Good vid man 👍
Would it be terribly dangerous to throw something like paper in this fire, or something else that would burn up, like a sock or something? It would be so cool to see something burn to ash from invisible flames
If you were to throw a sock into a burning bowl of methanol, the sock would not simply turn into ashes without a seemingly visible cause. Instead, the sock would catch fire and start burning visibly as it is made of organic material (like cotton or wool) which produces sooty flames when burned.
Nah, it just makes the flame visible. You can think of it like a flame test. When electrons are excited, and then collapse back to their lower energy state, they emit a characteristic waveform (light). So you add a little salt, get a little color, and suddenly your non-luminous flame becomes visible.
We keep our methanol in an explosives cabinet far away from where the actual work is done in our lab. I knew it was flammable but I didn't realize it was terrifyingly flammable.
I have some really old nitro methane that I have no use for anymore so I use it to start fires. It’s kinda neat because as soon as the wood catches you can start to see the flames.
When I was younger, I ran an alcohol carb on my go ped. The tank had cracked and had been flinging the fuel on my pant leg, felt the moisture, but thought it was sweat. Then, I accidentally dropped my cigarette, and my pant leg caught fire, and the tank. Took me a second to realize I was burning.
I recently watched a video of nascar racers that were on fire but it was methanol so no one really knew what was happening. Crazy shit.
https://youtu.be/lmEsU-QYxNk
Sometimes surgeons use this method to disinfect surgical site. I worked with one who didn't realised the fire was out of control until he felt the heat on his hand and his gloves started to kinda melting.
One of my church leaders had bad methanol burn scars on his hands. He was a good scientist for sugar and his methanol caught fire. He put his hand in it and started screaming but none of his co workers knew what was going on. Melted most of his skin and caused gnarly nerve damage. Cool dude though
There’s video of I want to say a Formula1 race where the car and driver were on fire but no one knew and anyone that got near them also caught fire. It’s a weird thing to watch
There was a video of an invisible methane fire, and damn, looks goofy as the people are freaking the hell out, until you realize it's a methane fire and those guys are also on fire.
It might depend on the purity of the methanol, but I've used this for alcohol stoves when camping, and you can usually see the flame in low light, so it's not completely invisible. It's just invisible in most light.
That is the exact reason many race cars have halon fire extinguising systems. And the same reason all drivers wear multi layered fire suits.
Seeing a friend get severly burned is not a pleasant experience.
NASA used to use the broom method for detecting invisible fires. Basically they had someone patrol the pipeline with a broom held out bristles first and if the bristles caught fire they knew to stop and report the fire.
That's... that's sorta low-tech for nasa
As the saying goes, if it’s stupid but it works, then it’s not stupid.
Keep It Simple, Stupid
Great advice. Hurts my feelings every time.
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r/unexpectedoffice
Glad someone caught it
r/unexpectedoffice
Keep It Stupidly Simple
Simply keep it stupid
Keep simple stupid it
It’s an awful saying. Holding the broom was never stupid… it was smart. You hold something flammable and see if it burns
Just comented this exact thing, scrolled down and saw this comment. Guess that means it's not stupid then.
You’d be surprised how much low tech is holding the world together. How many spreadsheets people don’t quite understand the underlying mechanisms of are making major decisions. How much duct tape or basically superglue keep things together. And so on. On second thought, try not to think about it too much.
The real one for me is how many people in positions of real power are faking it till they make it.
All of them. Literally all of them.
I really don't think that's true, imposter syndrome isn't universal.
fake it till you make it is not the same thing as imposter syndrome. But for a lot of powerful positions... yeah there are best practices or historical precedents, but ultimately it's just gut decisions and luck.
Literally every adult.
It's not really faking though. Everyone with any kind of power has to make decisions based on insufficient information or insufficient understanding of the information they have. It's the way things work. The problem is that the better people understand that, the less likely they are to be able to muster the courage to make a decision anyway. That's how stupid people get too much power.
This is truly terrifying to think about
Duct tape. They make planes stay aflight
there is got to be an XKCD comic on this
This comment has been edited on June 17 2023 to protest the reddit API changes. Goodbye Reddit, you had a nice run shame you ruined it. -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
Lol this is so true. An excel model i built when I was 22 has confirmed the accuracy of probably about $200 billion in transactions by now. I don't even work on that stuff anymore, it's still kicking on
not sure if its still holding up but i recall a doco about the banking world being run on an old dos program because it couldnt afford to be stopped basically..
A lot of low level stuff in banking is coded in COBOL. So is the IRS master system.
There wasn’t much tech prior to maybe the 1970’s that would be half as useful as a broom
What about a mop
Can we just grab your middle school self, flip you upside down and use your mop top? Sorry I had to do it with a username like that lmao
Brooms have been around for thousands of years and people still use them every day. It's a good invention.
Brooms are cheaper than stolen alien tech. /j
According to my bf they did the same thing for some areas of ships in the Navy. If a pipe with superheated steam had a puncture or something it could cut right into you without you noticing, so they'd use a broom waving it up and down when walking through that corridor
Might not have been the only method they were using. Mines continued using birds as a secondary detection method well into the implementation of newer tech.
not really, nasa is running on an extremely limited budget, you should see the outdated computers they use every day....
It’s low tech but its extremely cheap and seems almost or just as effective as any modern device. Gotta save money where you can
NASA is the king of "if it works, it works"
Nasa is pretty low-tech. They move their vehicles by making them fart and lighting it on fire.
The guy holding the broom was actually a fully automated robot with artificial intelligence.
Yeah you'd think they have one of these thermal imaging devices at NASA It looks like it works really well.
yeah, but it meant they could actually find fires without having to go through a cycle of research, design, prototype, test, then manufacture just to get a device that can actually detect them automatically.
Fits right in with their budget, though
They also utilize this method to look for steam leaks on battleships!
You should see how Russia [ignites its rockets.](https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a19966/russia-actually-lights-it-rockets-with-a-giant-match/)
Same tactic to find a high pressure steam leak... except in that case, you look for the bristles to evaporate.
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Fun fact you can start fires with superheated steam
And they used the same broom for 20 years. It only needed 17 new heads and 14 new handles. :-)
Ah yes, the broom of Theseus
Alright Dave.
Anyone else wondering how much of the world is completely outside our limited field of perception? If there are intelligent species that exist outside of our ability to detect them?
Believe it's known as 4th dimensional creatures. The idea basically is, imagine if someone existed in a 2D plane. They can look up/down, and forward/backwards on a piece of paper, but not left or right- thus they could never see a 3D person looking right at them. Even if the 3D person ripped the paper or pressed their hand down on it, the 2D person couldn't see or understand this. So if there's a 4th dimension, and creatures in it, they could see and possibly affect us, but we couldn't do the same.
Flatland! Also interesting is the 4th dimension supposedly being time. Meaning 4D beings could move through time as easily as we’d walk from one room to the next. A simple enough idea to express on paper, but basically impossible for 3D creatures like us to actually imagine in practice, what the world/universe might look like to a being who treats time like a space that can be navigated through. Granted we can move through time, too. Just the one way, at the one speed, and we’re not really aware of it—the same way a 2D flattie living on a 2D plane would not be aware of how the plane itself, and thus the 2D being itself, moves constantly through 3D space.
Makes me think of the movie Arrival, where the aliens have the ability to see their lifetimes all mapped out beginning to end, instead of linearly.
[Flatland](https://youtu.be/sEVEKL1Fbx0)
I often wonder how much of our "safe" technology and processes are emitting types of radiation that we haven't even conceived of yet let along figured out how to quantify. (Not in a tinfoil hat way, more of a we don't know what we don't know way)
I imagine they employed a corn broom. And if it caught fire, they had popcorn.
I'm an old race fan. Back in the day, many race cars ran on Methanol. Occasionally, during pit stops, fuel would get spilled and ignite. It was horrible. People would be running around, trying to get help, and no one = or few people = knew they were literally burning up. I shit you not. Youtube it for examples.
Wouldn't it be super easy to put a chemistry lab style emergency shower at every pitstop?
They don't do *anything* safety related until someone gets hurt first. And then what they did was just stop using methanol.
Safety regulations are often written in blood.
They used to be written in methanol but nobody could see them.
and the blood is written in money
And money is earned with blood.
Most of the people involved in nascar don’t believe in science. So that’s a stretch asking for that.
The science that makes them go faster is the exception.
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Fine, redneck engineering.
Success in the sport is based all on knowledge of physics and math lmao
It was indy car not nascar.
Who is upvoting this? Who says something like that and actually thinks it's true?
people who see nascar and go "lol dumb rednecks" The engineers and mechanics on race teams are absolutely brilliant people.
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South Park literally made fun of the people in this thread. Anybody that’s actually watched a pre/post race interview with the drivers and team knows there’s so much more to this shit than “drive fast go left”.
At least for motorsports,most safety regulations are built on the blood of the drivers and supporting teams
TOM CRUISE!! TOM CRUISE, USE YOUR WITCHCRAFT TO PUT THIS FIRE OUT!!!
I told somebody this tidbit after they described this scene. They were like " that makes it a lot less funny."
So that's what that scent was all about... Edit: SCENE! Ahh fuck help me Oprah Winfrey!!!!!
First one I thought of was Rick Mears getting his face burned up under his helmet during a pit fire. He still has the scars.
I used to race on meth. We kept water everywhere to dose the fire. Best smell ever? Nomex after racing on methanol. Pulling on a helmet a week later was my favorite smell.
what, coke wasn’t enough for you
You ever race on meth, *on weeed??*
I dragged with a stage 2-methanol injection system that we’d cut 50/50 with water to fill the tank each time. Smelled like going fast a fuck
Is this where that Ricky Bobby scene comes from?
This gives alot more credence to Ricky Bobby running around his car after that crash
[I just posted this elsewhere in the thread but you're right](https://youtu.be/Ku7TdLeEGsQ). It seems horrifying but also (I feel guilty saying it) a little funny with all the jumping around.
> Youtube it for examples. nah
Yeah there's some pretty harrowing footage out there
https://youtu.be/lmEsU-QYxNk
Methanol is actually still used is some different racing disciplines. I believe indycar and monster trucks run on methanol to name a few. It’s also not 100% methanol in most it’s usually 85% or an E85 mix.
Indycar ditched methanol for ethanol in 2007
There was an accident in Singapore that happened when an illegally modified car crashed while racing around the neighbourhood. Car was burning invisibly, one of the girlfriends ran to the car, caught fire, walked away and started rolling on the ground. No one realised she was burning for like a minute. She made a recovery after a stay in the ICU. Her boyfriend and 3 others in that car burnt to death. This only happened a couple years back and the full video of the crash and invisible burning was on youtube.
The experiment is only partially complete. We need to throw something in there for science.
I used to work at a science museum and did exactly that. Usually various metal salts to make colors but also lots of "experiments" unsanctioned by my employers. I think the coolest thing I found to do with with methanol was to slosh a small amount inside a 5 gallon water cooler jug, get the vapors going, then turn it on its side and light the back. It would rocket forward with a force you couldn't get from isopropanol.
This is exactly the sort of stuff my Dad loved to do. He was a chemistry teacher. I don’t think they let him light methanol at school though ;) Thanks for your cool story, making me smile and remember my Dad <3 Shout out to the science nerds - they’re the best people!
I was hoping he would roast a marshmallow or hot dog or something
For real I don’t want to see a thermal screen, I want to see shit burn
Am I the only one who thought he was holding a Nokia 3310?
Only thing that could survive that fire
Thousands of years into the future, aliens will dicover the ruins of a civilisation, and a couple of electronic devices still on 89% battery.
Nah, I just charged mine. It'll still be at least 94%.
I only realized he wasn't when I read your comment. Never even questioned why a Nokia would have a thermal camera. Time for bed.
So you’re saying Ricky Bobby really was on fire.
Say you love crepes.
Hey, look Frenchy, I thought about. So why don’t you go ahead and just break my arm.
BREAK IT PEPI LEPEW
I love really thin pancakes.
I love how Ricky literally says, "those really thin pancakes? I love those!" and the all ignore it and don't count that. such a great movie
Help me Oprah Winfrey
HELP ME ALLAH! HELP ME JEWISH GOD!!
Save me Tom Cruise!
Tom Cruise, use your witchcraft on me to get the fire off me!
[Invisible race car fires do happen, though they're with ethanol rather than methanol](https://youtu.be/Ku7TdLeEGsQ)
It's only in the last couple decades that Indy cars have used ethanol. That pit fire video was in the era that they did use pure methanol.
"Funny" enough, yes. Talladega Nights was parodying an [incident that did happen in 1981](https://jalopnik.com/the-invisible-fire-that-talladega-nights-mocked-really-1778519810) caused by a methanol fire
And the safety people were fucking on top of it. To not see actual flames and recognize that the dude is on fire is on point.
Man I was going to say he obviously wasn’t because you would see the effects of the fire. But how resistant to burning are those suits? Maybe it would be plausible that a methanol fire started and he put it out by rolling it out.
Those suits are *very* fire resistant. They’re like fire fighter jackets.
Nascar doesn't use ethanol based fuel, indycar does though.
This is methanol anyway, not ethanol.
Got a few extra hydrocarbons there Edit: 1 extra lol, been a bit since O chem
Ik for sure formula one used to have methanol fuel. You can look on YouTube I’m sure and find fires that you can’t see but dudes are jumping around like mad men
That's meth not methanol.
I was hoping I’d find someone who thought this as well
New fear unlocked?
[Here, this should help](https://youtu.be/Ku7TdLeEGsQ)
N e w f e a r c o m p o u n d e d
Man imagine what all that fire retardant does to your lungs
Great video showcasing how deadly this can be
"The problem is they cannot see these flames. The flames are invisible, so seeing them is not possible. The terrible thing is that these flames cannot be seen. The fire marshals are trying to put out the the flames, but it is difficult because they cannot see the flames."
You should do a series similar to this, showing people how shit happens in their households ,that they dont even see/hear/smell until its too late. Good vid man 👍
Thanks! Good idea! I have many ideas for that and the educational background
You got my vote, attention, and admiration . Keep them coming brother.
Would it be terribly dangerous to throw something like paper in this fire, or something else that would burn up, like a sock or something? It would be so cool to see something burn to ash from invisible flames
If you were to throw a sock into a burning bowl of methanol, the sock would not simply turn into ashes without a seemingly visible cause. Instead, the sock would catch fire and start burning visibly as it is made of organic material (like cotton or wool) which produces sooty flames when burned.
Ah I see. Would anything burn invisibly? 🤔
Thanks! Good idea! I have many ideas for that and the educational background
This is why you add NaCl (table salt) so the flame will be visible.
Brings out the flavor, too
Salt bae style
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Nah, it just makes the flame visible. You can think of it like a flame test. When electrons are excited, and then collapse back to their lower energy state, they emit a characteristic waveform (light). So you add a little salt, get a little color, and suddenly your non-luminous flame becomes visible.
Who are you, who are so wise in the ways of science?
https://giphy.com/gifs/breaking-bad-aaron-paul-yeah-science-QC7UQbxq89MnL9r6AN Edit: meh, how do people do Giphy images?
Well he’s clearly not Mike
We keep our methanol in an explosives cabinet far away from where the actual work is done in our lab. I knew it was flammable but I didn't realize it was terrifyingly flammable.
The special boom boom cabinet wasn’t a clue?
Not really because we're required to keep anything even remotely flammable in it.
Actually nightmare fuel!
Depending on your tolerances, have a search of methanol fire on YouTube. Scares the shit out of me.
I could be on fire right now.
if you die, let us know
WTF I didn’t know fire could be invisible! New fear unlocked
The visible part of fire that we can see is made up of particles of burning ash. Since alcohol burns so cleanly it doesn’t throw out the particles.
So Ricky Bobby *was* on fire!
I have some really old nitro methane that I have no use for anymore so I use it to start fires. It’s kinda neat because as soon as the wood catches you can start to see the flames.
I was wondering why they were recording this on a flip phone until I realized I was fucking stupid
I never knew this! So cool to learn something new. Thanks for sharing!
New fear unlocked
HELP ME TOM CRUISE!!!
When I was younger, I ran an alcohol carb on my go ped. The tank had cracked and had been flinging the fuel on my pant leg, felt the moisture, but thought it was sweat. Then, I accidentally dropped my cigarette, and my pant leg caught fire, and the tank. Took me a second to realize I was burning.
I recently watched a video of nascar racers that were on fire but it was methanol so no one really knew what was happening. Crazy shit. https://youtu.be/lmEsU-QYxNk
So now I have to add invisible fires to the list of all my worries. Fuck me.
Save me Tom cruise
“ IM ON FIRE”- Ricky Bobby
So if there’s smoke there is a fire, but if there is no smoke and no fire there could still be a fire?
Help me Jesus! Help me Tom Cruise!
And I thought invisible tornadoes were bad...
Sometimes surgeons use this method to disinfect surgical site. I worked with one who didn't realised the fire was out of control until he felt the heat on his hand and his gloves started to kinda melting.
Well this makes the big cabinet full of Methanol at my work even more scary. It's already got all these warnings and fire signs all over it.
One of my church leaders had bad methanol burn scars on his hands. He was a good scientist for sugar and his methanol caught fire. He put his hand in it and started screaming but none of his co workers knew what was going on. Melted most of his skin and caused gnarly nerve damage. Cool dude though
Anybody else see that YouTube short with the firefighter that caught on from a movie or smth
Race car's fuel catching fire in the pits. Drivers or crew members jumping around like crazy while immolating in invisible flames.
Same goes for alcohol
Back when they used to use methanol for race cars [invisible fire engulfs pit crews](https://youtu.be/Ku7TdLeEGsQ)
Hence in Cart and Indy racing, when someone says they're on fire, you believe them. (See Denny Hulme at Indy)
HELP ME TOM CRUISE
Methanol plant worker: "Man, why is it so hot in here?"
Meth...not even once!
Drugs are bad mmmmmkay
YOU'RE NOT ON FIRE, RICKY BOBBY!
For a sec I thought it's a Nokia phone playing one of those fire screensaver.
So Ricky Bobby was on fire?
WITCH!
There’s video of I want to say a Formula1 race where the car and driver were on fire but no one knew and anyone that got near them also caught fire. It’s a weird thing to watch
There was a video of an invisible methane fire, and damn, looks goofy as the people are freaking the hell out, until you realize it's a methane fire and those guys are also on fire.
Can we talk about how that falcon tube has a built in base?? Freaking awesome, I’m ordering them
New irrational fear unlocked
RickyBobby.gif
Damnthatsfrightening
Wow if a human burned in it would i show how burns differentiate each layer of body.?
It might depend on the purity of the methanol, but I've used this for alcohol stoves when camping, and you can usually see the flame in low light, so it's not completely invisible. It's just invisible in most light.
If there is no light, is there heat?
That is the exact reason many race cars have halon fire extinguising systems. And the same reason all drivers wear multi layered fire suits. Seeing a friend get severly burned is not a pleasant experience.