Fire can become one of the most destructive and unforgiving forces known to man, destroying everything in its path. With this in mind we try to add some perspective on the prevention, detection and extinguishing of fires within ports and terminals as well as vessels.
The key areas are those of education first and foremost, closely followed by understanding risks and threats and then the implementation of passive and active fire protection, as well as notification.
Understanding your surroundings, storage, operating areas and contents are the first steps to reducing the risks of fire. It is advisable to get advice from specialists who can establish the layers of identification before you start to design out the threat of fire.
The layers of identification can be multiple and multi faceted. Starting with a footprint of the facility and understanding if you need to protect the property, people or products first. This will guide you towards the first layer of prevention required.
Together with this understanding, you also need to be a little creative with your approach and aim to apply notification on each layer. Without notification, whether through visual indication or audible alerts, you will lose a possibly critical chance to stop a fire. The basic layers can be applied as follows…
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