What is the nature of the business, and or substance/ chemical/ activity or process that would give rise to the need for emergency showers? Best regards,

Food manufacturing, so there is Cleaning chemicals such as Nitric acid, caustic, etc. No I have not asked the suppliers but will do. Just wanted to check if the HSE or BS had any requirements already in place. Cheers,

Safetyman You have mail.

Consider the location carefully since each shower will need to be run for at least a couple of minutes once a week and the wrong placement can result in routinely wet and slippery floors and if you are really unlucky, wet and soggy products, raw materials and the like - not something you want from a shower test/flush. Don't forget that routine Legionella testing may also be required.

Its a long time since I needed to specify emergency showers - and I haven't tried to download the Hughes guide... But from first principles - if your staff are handling (concentrated) acids and similar (in bulk / large quanities) the 'two to three minutes' you identify is too far to be of any practical use. Emergency (drench) showers must be installed virtually adjacent to the operation / installation which creates the risk. The vehicle unloading point, the bulk store, the mixing bay, etc.. As I say it's a long time since I specified but I seem to recall a (company?) standard that suggested no more than ten feet travel.. But we were routinely dealing with concentrated caustic soda, nitric sulphuric and Hydrolcholric acids, glacial acetic, plus and ammonia liquid chlorine, ... plus several other corrosive gases and aggressive solvents... If you are dealing with what I would class as 'food strength' acids, then ordinary showers may suffice? Our maintenance guys had monthly functional tests (have they really gone up to weekly?) on over one hundred and thirty emergency showers and eye wash stations...... It would have been more but we had molten metal in many areas and it was deemed not safe to instal showers in those areas... And make certain the water supply is properly identified and kept secure. One of the first serious injuries I had to deal with involved an acid splashed operator jumping on the emergency shower plate - and being drenched with neat caustic soda. Lost the sight in one eye, and permanently disfigured through thermal and caustic damage - the acid itself (10% nitric) would most likely only have caused temporary burns and blistering damage. [The steam line had been used as a 'temporary' trace de-icer for the caustic line through a cold spell, and there was mix-up when things were being cross connected in the spring....] Steve