When the jokers wake up this thread will be worth watching.

The mythical "waste bin fire" is frequently quoted but consider a bin full of banana skins, tea bags, soggy sandwiches and last weeks half-full sour milk carton at one end of the scale and a similar size bin full of polystyrene cups, a couple of pairs of nylon tights and a discarded aerosol at the other, both well alight. Very different fire scenarios.

The first can possibly be dealt with by controlled use of an extinguisher, the second is probably beyond most people's capabilities and who's to tell the difference?

And then think about the welder in a typical light engineering factory who may use an extinguisher for real every few weeks

Given appropriate education, training and practice (i.e. specific to the environment) I suggest that the best person to make that judgement is the person on the spot.

David I would like to put up a serious answer but can't get past your second waste bin fire. The contents of the bin must be the result of quite some office party :-)

My mistake, I should elucidate. I was ask at a committee meeting why do we have fire extinguishers if we`re not supposed to use them??
And I didn't have a quick and witty answer!!!

Because it always seems to be given as 'advice' not an outright instruction. I'm currently sat in a modern office with modern equipment, a low 'nature of occupancy' risk. however, if my PC goes up in smoke (and they do occasionally) I'm personally going to grab the CO2 extinguisher that's 4ft away from me and empty it into the vents (having isolated the electrical supply first) but I am under no obligation to do this as an employee (despite my training).

You Friday posters are very slow this week. When should you use an extinguisher? When the door wedges have been confiscated!

Seriously - we have had 17 buildings inspected recently and the Fire Service have quoted the fire safety order in their recommendations and advised us to train additional staff in the use of fire extinguishers.

Lets be clear I am not advocating no fire extinuishers - only in certain circumstances

Puting aside the legalities, for a moment.

A typical modern business park in a populated area - modern buildings/design, purely commecial 'office based' activities, clear escape routes, short travel distances, correct numbers of fire escapes. Electrical installation tested and maintained, no smoking in the premises (being current law). Due to the type of work/occupancy a fire would be readily apparent.

Risk of a fire I would suggest is pretty low. Even if a PC goes pop, un plug it - the likelihood of a sudden fire going out of control is remote.

The biggest arson risk is probably after hours, when the building is unoccupied - in which case fire extinguishers serve no purpose.

So what risk reduction do fire extinguisers actually give?

A colleague of mine advised on safety in a facility where there was a lot of malicious damage to the extinguishers. He proposed to remove the extinguishers and issue everyone with a fire blanket. Not sure this would have complied with legislation.

RRFSO is only concerned with life safety.

Property/loss prevention is a separae issue.

"I was ask at a committee meeting why do we have fire extinguishers if we`re not supposed to use them?"

We advise that raising the alarm and evacuation is the main priority. Staff should only consider attempting to fight fires if their route is blocked by a fire and no alternative route/exit is available.

This also explains why we do not site extinguishers in rooms/offices, only in corridors and near to final exit doors.


We are office based staff btw.

Answered comprehensively at #3 ..........

ptaylor14 look at #5 that answers your question.

I really do not understand what all the fuss is about!

Extinguishers are just large aerosol cans, so operating them is child's play (with some caveats for the CO2!).

Using them safely is another matter! The fire service (with all their fancy breathing apparatus, hoses and pumps) use a risk based approach when determining how to extinguish any fire, and will* only ever enter a burning premises to protect savable property.

*Subject to a RA

So businesses should use the same approach and, during training, stress that fire extinguishers are aimed at 'first aid' firefighting only. So in the same way medical first aiders can't do a huge amount where someone has been decapitated, first aid firefighting is for small, simple fires - perhaps those that have been discovered in the early stages of their development, and not for developed fires or where there is lots of smoke.

Training should be risk based and its always better to keep it simple if possible

The vast majority of the extinguisher training we provide is for medium to high risk premises so is quite involved. It is not necessary to get too involved for low risk office admin areas.

The training focuses on teaching 'extinguisher craft' - ie how to risk assess whether to attempt extinguishing a fire and how that process should be constantly repeated. The training looks at examples of how a fire develops and spreads. It stresses that within a room or compartment, fire behaves significantly different than - say a bonfire in the open air.

Only after this input is there a hands on session. For our fire response teams, we now use 'real fire'. Small cages of cardboard and wood in the open air, but for fire wardens its just a show and tell demonstration

Afterwards, candidates are able to access a refreshers a very short e-learning package which includes the videos shown during the training. Access to this package is restricted (as entering a staff pay number is required to view) to those who have attended the full fire awareness course in the last 24 months. This is to ensure it is used just as a reminder

Interesting discussion. Those of you who remember the preamble to the RRFSO may member the four reasons why walking away from a fire shouldnnot be a default position.
1 It is better to try to put out a fire before it becomes established as when the fire service arrive it will be bigger and a greater risk to fire fighter safety
2 We should not accept the argument that insurers will pay as increased premiums affect eversyone
3 A major fire could affect other business's if leftbto spread
4. Business continuity issues - a major fire can put a business out of business

Discussions at the time were around how to change the culture of organisations . At the same time over 65% of all fires were hidden in their early stages or were down to arson when the building was empty yet the opportunity (in England) lost with no requirement for sprinklers.

Do others remember the background the same way

David

When I done Fire training I was informed, that if it is a small fire, then you should attempt to put it out using one extinguisher, if you have not successfully put it out then exit.

Look again at my offering at #5.

A Kurdsal I would have thought that fire blankets would be plentiful inside laboratories and that fire extinguishers may be dangerous in case they are used by inexperienced people who upset the chemicals? (There's an opportunity for ridicule ?)

I also find that usually where there if high chance of fire the precautions are good.

Thank you Jane, I am not too old to be educated.

There you are then, a place with a reasonable fire risk and a proper control measure. The wrong method eliminated.

Yes Jane is right we have both fire blankets and fire extinguishers in our labs and users have to know which own to use for which fire. If they are unsure then I tell them to get out and raise the alarm.
And yes most people are surprised by how quickly a fire extinguisher discharges and I tell them if one blast don't put out the flames, to get out.

Fire fighting kit harks back to the days when the boss's property was considered more valuable than the employees lives.
Prior to the deindustrialisation of the UK in the 1970s & 80s, most large works had a fire fighting team (I was in one) who were expected to put their lives on the line, to protect plant.

FRA never caught up with the current thinking.

I was Chief Fire Officer of a works fire brigade for four years after I left the fire brigade and we had 27 volunteers who attended a one hour training session every week.

They were rewarded by a "bounty" that was paid once a year and depended on their number of attendances.

They were trained in BA and firefighting with proper firefighting hoses from a permanently live fire main throughout the site.

We had a Land Rover fire tender complete with basic fire fighting equipment and that was kept fully serviced and "ready" to go at a moments notice.

The factory was 100% wet pipe sprinkler protected and that was checked and maintained as required.

I had a full time fire extinguisher maintenance chap, who was also a member of the works fire brigade.

Despite all the above we still experienced fires in the factory, nothing too large but enough to prove the worth of the works fire brigade as they responded in a professional manner to every incident and always received the thanks of the Plant Manager and his management team.

Having said all that we experienced a fire in a a ladies toilet one afternoon and that was extinguished by a female member of the production line who had never ever received any training in fire fighting. She used a water extinguisher correctly and without any harm to herself. I have to say that if there were no fire extinguishers of the correct type at the fire point close to the fire, and if she had not "had a go" the factory may have suffered great damage with employees out of work for at least a short period of time and loss of income for the employer.

I would never have put those volunteers in a position that may have resulted in harm to them. They were not expected to put their lives on the line as suggested by walker.

Correct training is essential and so are fire extinguishers in the workplace, just don't expect people to always know what to do and how to do it.

#39

And repairing damaged road surfaces.