"More than a half-dozen fire trucks responded..."

 

On our plant tours we will ask a worker or two “when was your last evacuation drill?” In our opinion a very simple question. We expect a quick answer. If the worker(s) has to think when it was, it was too long ago. Here is an incident that brings to awareness the importance of evacuation drills.

More than a half-dozen fire trucks responded to a reported fire early on morning during the first week of December 2020 at an aluminum plant in the USA.

Firefighters are asking drivers to avoid the area (around the well know aluminium plant).

Aluminium company spokesperson said an incident involving a piece of auxiliary equipment was detected at approximately 5:45 am Tuesday. She said firefighters arrived on the scene within minutes. The incident was reported under control by 7:52 a.m., she said.

“The incident did not take place in any of the main structures of the facility and no injuries have been reported,” Aluminium company spokesperson said.

She said the cause of the incident, which she described as a smoke incident rather than a fire, is still unknown.

We are thankful no one was injured in this incident. Another news media articles stated the fire occurred in an outbuilding containing a dust collector. We assume that is why there was a large amount of smoke. Now imagine your plant, if this occurred could you and your workers safely evacuate? Don’t discount this question. Because we have had incidents where fires generated lots of smoke have resulted in workers becoming lost inside their plants looking for an exit. We know of a few incidents where workers became disoriented and had to be rescued by fireman. On one or two incidents we know of workers who perished from smoke inhalation.

When was the last time your plant had an evacuation drill?

The Aluminium Times Magazine had an article on this topic.

Please comment.