Comments by Anthony Buck

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Various points raised, I'll take each in turn:

- Numbers of extinguishers: Determined by risk assessment, using the scales in BS5306-8 as a bench,ark guide. Be aware some special activities have their own scales, such as hazardous goods (ADR) & LPG use and storage

- Extinguisher service company: The anonymous poster running an extinguisher company does right to be anon as I would seriously question their competency if they had only heard of the public guides for extinguisher purposes, they should be aware and familiar with BS5306-3 for servicing and BS5306-8 for installation. Interestingly about 75% of extinguisher companies in one way or another do not service correctly or perform other sharp practice (but that's another discussion...)

- 'Disposable' or 'limited life' extinguishers: Usually BC or ABC powder extinguishers and constructed out of aerosol cans these types are free from the need for basic servicing as there are usually no checks that can be made above those by the user. The only caveat is that they must be replaced at the end of their warranty period. But not all extinguishers that are apparently 'disposable' in fact are - for example the Firemaster range of aerosol extinguishers are 5 year life service free, but the Guardian/Vanguard range of extinguishers are now refillable, gauged and require servicing to BS5306-8

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

No - see postings above.

An extinguisher may continue in service as long as it is in safe operable condition and suitable parts and components are available.

The only thing at every 10 years is that CO2 extinguishers require a new valve and the cylinder retesting to meet pressure safety regulations.*

Some suppliers would rather sell you a new CO2 and collect the scrap on the brass and aluminium.

More reputable companies will offer to do this pressure test (known as an overhaul) and to avoid the hassle of leaving you without an extinguisher and having to make a second visit they will swap yours for an extinguisher overhauled in the same year (a 'service exchange')

As both a new & an overhauled extinguisher have a 10 year span between tests there is no advantage to buying new.

* One make of sealed powder extinguisher (Nu swift strike knob type) only requires is extended service every 10 years as oppose to 5 years for other types.

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

It is a requirement to service your extinguisher to BS5306-3. This standard is taken as being the standard used by a competent person & you are required to use a competent person to maintain your fire fighting equipment under the Fire Safety Order.

You may find cowboys that won't do the tests, but you will loose out on the long run as your equipment is not being maintained competently as required by the Order and more importantly may not work correctly or be hazardous.

A competent person who is not allowed to carry out an extended service will put 'not maintained' on the service label, which will quite rightly upset your insurers and the fire authority.

Fire fighting agents do decay and have a shelf life and many of the current types of extinguisher cannot be correctly checked for correct function & safety unless discharged and disassembled.

I am fed up of people who try and wriggle out of their obligations to providing and maintaining safety equipment correctly in general, get our extinguishers serviced properly - shop around and it shouldn't cost the earth.

If you have a small workplace you can avoid all servicing by using disposable powder extinguishers, carrying out the annual user checks and replacing them every 5 years, works out far cheaper than having the reusable types and servicing them, just be aware powder isn't always the best for everything

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

The HSE might be right in that there are no national statute regulations on hardhat colour, but there is nothing wrong to stop Network Rail setting their own rules on PPE for contractors who work for them, just like the Highways Agency have rules on the type of high viz garment, vehicle conspicuity markings & warning lighting to be used by companies working on roads under their control.

The Railway has peculiar risks of it's own and systems developed over decades through Railways regulations & by-laws to manage this, a notable one being the colour of high viz garments.

This story is a reminder that contractors should make sure they are fully aware of and comply with site rules on a job & should not be used as an attack against Network Rail

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

The introduction from some unknown source of disposable gloves in catering in recent years has probably been the biggest cause of increased risk from food handling I can think of.

People think that you put a pair of gloves on and wear them the whole day/shift. However the surfaces of gloves are just as liable to harbour contamination and bacteria as the hands.

If you are using gloves properly then whenever you would have washed your hands in the old days during catering operations you should put on fresh gloves - but this never happens! (& if it did it would demonstrate the worthlessness of gloves as instead of getting through hundreds of £ of gloves a year, just wash your hands!)

The PC H&S pedant brigade that brought this in have very little real knowledge of food safety or microbiology and it's all just a Pr exercise - it looks more hygienic to wear gloves to the untrained public, whereas it's quite the opposite.

Gloves could be suitable if a food handler had an allergy to a food (although with PPE being a last resort I'd rather move them to another role of possible).

If someone had a skin disorder or illness that might require gloves then they are not fit for food handling anyway, just like those with a severe cold or recent history of D&V.

In fact gloves can be downright dangerous with hot food as any burn injury will be far worse as the glove melts into the skin underneath.

In the good old days you would simply wash hands regularly, have a blue plaster on any minor cuts and only get gloves out when cleaning the premises to protect yourself from the cleaning chemicals - and thats how it should remain, why do you think the law requires wash hand basins in food premises in the first place?

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Is the kitchen a true kitchen or what most places now have i.e, a 'tea' area, which is either a small cupboard sized area or a section of an open office, usually comprising a sink, cupboards, kettle, fridge toaster & microwave?

Changing the head to a multi-sensor (combined heat/smoke) may help if in an open area - if the 'kitchen area is it's own room then it should be a heat.

Although potential issues in your question should be answered by a risk assessment, placing a toaster on non combustible metal surfaces is generally better than carpeting.

Is the detector a real smoke detector connected to the building's fire alarm system or a 9v domestic smoke alarm that creep into some offices by well meaning, but ill informed H&s staff - if the later it can probably be dispensed with completely a sit isn't serving a life safety or property safety role and will be non compliant with only one powe source anyway

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Missing link to fire forum (its non commercial, non profit):

http://www.fire.org.uk/punbb/upload/index.php

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Free government guidance to allow you to manage your fire safety & carry out your fire risk assessments in house are available at http://www.communities.gov.uk/fire/firesafety/firesafetylaw/

The Fire specific forum at
is also of use.

We carry out a lot of fire safety assessment & advice for companies and try to be realistic & not OTT in what we do and if after using the above still think you need the advice of external competent persons, please get in touch.

Anthony Buck BSc CMIOSH MIFPO
Fire Safety Consultant
www.smms.co.uk

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

If, and it's a big if until a full report is published, it started in the fast food kiosk/kitchen's fryers, then it could have been easily prevented or suppressed without the whole pavilion needing the cost of sprinklers.

Several big loss fires have started as small & supressable (with the right kit) but due to errors in fire protection and day to day management spread to a devastating size.

Prevention:
- maintenance of thermostats on fryers
- regular changing of fat after prolonged use (auto ignition tepmerature lowers over time)
- ensuring extract filters are in place and regularly cleaned down
- ensuring duct work is periodically deep cleaned of fat deposits

Suppression:
- a fixed Wet Chemical or Water Mist suppression system, or at the least Wet Chemical portable extinguisher
- staff training in the use of the above, as well as in prevention methods

Too many kitchens with fat fryers over 3 litres have poor or inadequate maintenance and cleaning regimes, poor training and the wrong fire fighting equipment (just a fire blanket and a powder, foam or CO2 extinguisher)

With sensible precautions the fire would have been very unlikely to occur & if it did it would be suppressed in about 4 seconds. Once it's got in the ducting, especially if not clean, it's game over.

Technical note: Cooking Oil fires (Class F) are now categorised separately from other flammable liquids & liquifiable solids (Class B). Whilst the temperature of the liquid in a Class B fire may only be around 90C, a class F fire, which start due to auto-ignition, will be around 350C. This means a fire blanket will burn through in about 3 minutes*, a foam blanket burns up and doesn't seal the fire & CO2 dissipates before the fat cools down so it re-ignites. In the 60's & 70's Powder may have worked as alkaline bicarbonate based 'BC' powders were used which can saponify the fat to some extent, but modern powder extinguishers use 'ABC' powder which is an acidic phosphate compound, which does not saponify, so that although flames are knocked down whilst using the extinguisher once it runs out the remaining heat still in the fat auto ignites it again.
Wet chemicals are alkaline salts of potassium which react with the fat to saponify it, turning the surface fat into a soapy crust which seals of oxygen allowing the fat to cool over the following hours without re-igniting.

* Several reputable fire blanket manufacturers place warnings on their products that they are not effective on fat fires over 3 litres/300mm diameter (i.e. a chip pan). Reference to fire blankets in some fire protection codes for frying ranges is in fact to the little heard of Heavy Duty Fire Blanket (more akin to a welding drape in consistency), not the light duty blankets currently sold. In fact no-one actually manufactures Heavy Duty Fire Blankets, so you are left with Wet Chemical in portable appliances or Wet Chemical/Water mist for fixed systems.

An Ansul system is a trade name for a common brand of fixed system that originally used bicarbonate powder & now wet chemical

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Defibrillators do not need to be locked away and this can be counterproductive - the effectiveness of the AED lessens as time passes even if CPR is being given in the meantime.

After all Public Access AEDs are freely available in unlocked (but alarmed) cabinets in airports and train stations and the like.

No legal requirement for first aid at work purposes, your first aid assessment of need determines if you think they are required. Only requires a 4 or 8 hour initial course and annual 4 hour refresher to use, as there are plenty of visual and audio prompts and they don't let you do anything the machine thinks is not required

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

Nothing illegal about Stainless Steel/Polished Aluminium extinguishers, perfectly fine to use them as a risk assessed solution, i.e. hand in hand with signage and staff training.

Thousands are quite legitimately sold and installed each year.

Training is the key as not all makes colour code clearly - 3 of the 4 main producers of stainless steel extinguishers do use red, cream & blue panels, but one major one (Chubb/Thomas Glover) does use black for foam.

But remember it's the pictograms on the labels that govern usage and training should be based around this - the colouring is secondary and only still exists because of lobbying from the UK fire industry

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

From the description of the mode of administration it sounds like the drug is Midazolam. This is a Controlled Drug (like Morphine, etc) and subject to strict controls.

More importantly anti seizure drugs such as Midazolam & Diazepam are not required as a matter of course during a seizure and are only indicated in prolonged (> 5minutes) or repeating seizures, for which an ambulance should be summoned in any case (who will use the drug themselves) and it would be hazardous to use it as a matter of course - most seizures are a normal part of an epileptics life and as long as the patient hasn't sustained a secondary injury or a prolonged seizure simply needs the recovery position (post convulsions) monitoring and reassurance and will not require an ambulance or hospital admission

Neither a first aider nor an appointed person could use this drug routinely and neither training course covers it.

We train a wide range of industries in emergency care and first aid including dentistry (where these drugs are permitted) and have encountered issues along these lines before - for more detailed formal advice please contact me - anthony.buck@sm-ms.biz

Anthony
Ambulance qualified instructor
SM&MS Limited

Anthony Buck
Member - 15 posts

The (non profit) website FireNet has a fire safety forum that is good for queries www.fire.org.uk

Some bullet point answers to various points above:
- Coloured extinguishers not to EN3 did not have to be replaced in 1996, that was a con spread widely by extinguisher suppliers to sell new kit. A pre EN3 extinguisher can remain in service so long as they are safe for use and parts are available to allow correct servicing
- Not since the days of chemical operated extinguishers such as open stopper soda acid extinguishers has annual test discharging been required. It's 5 years for water,foam, powder & wet chemical & 10 years for CO2 (as part of the overhaul)
- New extinguishers are not needed every 5 years, it's just the company would rather sell you a new extinguisher than the time taken and couple of quid in parts to discharge and fill your existing one. However a service exchane of extinguishers is OK as long as the price is nearer that of a recharge than a new item
- Every 12 months for a basic service,there's enough case law to back up the need
-You can in theory risk assess away the need for extinguishers, but the official government guidance booklets(including those for small premises) point out that it is very very rare not to require one to fulfil the requirements of the Fire Safety Order
- For small premises a multi-purpose ABC powder extinguisher is best (as per the govt guide) as you can cover all risks with a small inexpensive unit. In fact reference is now made to the aerosol 'limited life' powder extinguishers as you buy them & only do use checks until it expires after 5 years and you replace it, this works out far cheaper than a reusable one as it costs as much to service it each year as it does to buy the limited life unit (which you only do every 5 years)
- Lots of fire companies try & pull the wool over your eyes and help perpetrate the urban myths spread by well meaning H&S advisers who are influenced, by them. If on doubt ask me or post on Firenet & we'll ensure you aren't stung (& the advice is free!)

Anthony Buck
Fire Safety Consultant
Portable Extinguisher Advisor & Historian