dross fire fills aluminium foundry with smoke...

The hazard associated with aluminium dross fires is well known throughout our industry. BUT, incidents still occur. Why? Because, our plants fail to educate their workers and most importantly they fail to educate the local fire departments who respond to a dross fire. Thankfully, this incident resulted in no injuries or fatalities because the aluminium company did train all parties involved before this incident occur. Here is a recent story that illustrates the importance of preplanning and training.

"The first alarm was at 7.18 clock, the use was completed for us at 10.50 clock," said a local fire department official. From what was not yet clarified, the aluminum remains in a container in one of the production halls had caught fire and caused an enormous amount of smoke in the building in Germany during the week of January 13, 2019. The fire alarm system was triggered by the smoke.

"When we arrived at the place of work, the (foundry) employees had already reacted well and pushed the burning container out of the hall into the open," said the fire department offical. The defense forces tried to extinguish the fire first with metal fire powder provided by a nearby nickel and stainless steel melt shop fire brigade. "But because the actual source of the fire was under all the debris, we could not completely quench all the embers," said a representative from the fire brigade

This succeeded in the following hours only with combined forces. A truckload of sand was brought to extinguish the fire."The company had already given us great support during a container fire last year - and now on Tuesday again," said a foundry representative. Support was also given to employees of a construction company, who was working on supply lines not far from the foundry site.

"So we were able to quickly transport the sand into the container with a large excavator. This of course accelerated the work, "said a foundry spokesman, who thanked both companies for their spontaneous assistance:" We really worked hand in hand. "

We are thankful that no one was injured in this incident. We chose not to mention the company name because we noticed that this company had a previous fire last year. We are glad that the company had the safety mechanism in place to address this fire. But, what would have happened if this fire occurred during the night, weekend, of holiday shutdown. Our concern is that the dross container was stored inside their building. Not an outbuilding. If this fire occurred during a time when the nearby companies who provided support were closed. This fire could have been much much worse.

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