Cremation: A Brief Rundown
Are they called Ashes?
Are they called ashes? In the funeral industry, the physical ashes that remain after cremation are known as cremains, a combination of the words cremated and remains. So, ashes, or cremains, are the tangible product that exists after a cremation. These are fragments that are swept out of the cremator (the large machine used to perform a cremation) after the cremation has taken place.
The cremation process begins with paperwork that is finalized in most states after death with a cremation authorization. Once all of the required documents are completed and approved, a rigid identification process of the body takes place.
The identification process usually involving placing a metal tag that will survive the cremation with the body that has matching numbers to the deceased’s paperwork. During the wait, the body is kept in a temperature-controlled chilled room or refrigeration. At this point, the body is also examined for any potential dangers, such as a pacemaker that, if present, is removed. Pacemaker batteries tend to explode and damage the brick lining of the retort (the space in the cremator where the body is placed) while also posing a risk to the crematory operator.
The body then is moved from the cooled room or refrigeration and taken to a high-powered furnace referred to as a cremator. During this time, the body is placed in a rigid container, which ensures that only one body can fit into the retort at a time. This cremator is powered by propane or gas, operating at an average temperature of 1800 degrees Fahrenheit. The person operating this high-powered furnace in most states is often a certified crematory operator (CCO) like me and has gone through additional specialized cremation training programs.
The body is placed inside the chamber called a retort for roughly two hours, allowing the body to break down into dense bone material by the flame-heated chambers of the cremator, then cools down for nearly half an hour depending on the facility’s equipment and procedures.
At this point, the bone fragments that remain in the retort are removed with a long-handled broom. During the removal of cremains from the retort, every effort is taken by the crematory operator to remove any remnants that exist, large or small. This effort to gather any remnants is undertaken to prevent the co-mingling of ashes since the same chamber will be used for the next cremation and so on. Since the chamber is not washed out or cleaned with anything other than the long-handled broom, a thorough sweeping is key in gathering all contents in the retort. At the same time, any surviving implanted materials, like a metal plate or an aluminum hip joint, are removed using a magnet and search of the cremains for recycling.
These implants often are recycled by companies explicitly established to serve the crematory and cemetery industries by recycling the metallic by-products of the cremation process.
Now that we know what happens to the human body during cremation and how the process works, we have reached the point when only bone fragments remain, some as small as a grain of sand, others still resembling pieces of bone. All of this is placed in a machine eloquently called a Pulverizer (think food processor, but for bones). This machine processes the differing sizes of bone fragments to a uniform consistency with the equivalency of course sand.
The average adult creates about five pounds of human cremains. These cremains take up a space of roughly two hundred cubic inches, which are placed in a container (a temporary urn) and returned to the family. Most often, this temporary urn is a plastic or cardboard container with a zip-tied plastic bag inside that holds the cremains before being placed in a permanent urn. Children’s cremains range from a small thimble-sized amount for premature birth to amounts that grow as the child reaches maturity. Rarely does the weight of the person vary the amount of cremains. Instead, the amount of cremains is impacted more by bone density with height coming in at a close second.
Once the cremation is complete, we have reached the point of final disposition.
The Point of Final Disposition is the point at which someone’s physical remains have reached a point of no return without extraordinary effort. In the context of burial, this occurs at the moment the casket is lowered into the ground in the cemetery. As far as most overarching government regulations are concerned, what you do with cremains following the cremation is the decision of the persons in charge, whether that is the next of kin or the “durable power of attorney with rights to disposition.”
If you are thinking about having your ashes placed in a garden check out: Are Ashes Bad For Your Garden?
If you want to know more about related subjects or want to explore and out of the box subject, Digital Remains by J.H. Harrington is a great read that hits on the changing worlds of technology and the end-of-life and how they intertwine.
