Fire Drill.

[Rabfaetheblae]

Hi

I work on an oil rig and we constantly get safety hammered into us, and because of this it has made me aware of safety issues at home and in the caravan.

It breaks my heart when i hear of young children being killed in fires, so last time home i had a fire drill where i pressed the alarm button and had the wife and the wee one get out the house quickly and safely, i intend to do the same thing in the caravan, ive allso fitted a carbon monoxide/fire alarm to the caravan.

if you get a chance to do this little drill please do,it means they will no what to do and not panic in the event of a real fire, god forbid.

Regards Rab

 

[Steve L]

Hi Rab.

This is a subject close to my heart too.

Having been a fire marshall for my old company (Hydro UK) and had the experience of not only tackling fires, but having to evacuate 260 people at 3am in torrential rain when the main 11'000 volt incoming line was being flooded due to the roof gutter leaking above the distribution box, is not a drill. It was very much for real!

As shift supervisor and marshall, my target was to have everyone accounted for inside three minuits.

Now the other day I was very pleased to see our site wardens and maintainence team on our caravan site being trained in basic fire fighting. So when I asked the manager when he was going to have a fire drill for the site, I was astounded to hear him say, "we won't be doing those".

I did remind him that as a commercial premises he is expected to have a weekly fire alarm test (which he has a notice indicating that) and at least once a year have a full blown fire drill, to test the evacuation and accountability proceedure that he should have displayed.

To people who have not been faced with life threatening emergency's this might seem OTT, but why wait for a real emergencey to findout just how bad you are as a team at evacuating everyone to safety and having full knowledge of who is missing!

I would happily bet

 

[WilliamLX]

This is something I have thought about. I worry that the door to our caravan is at the back, while the beds are at the front, so chances are if a fire starts the exit will have to be through the front window (which in the Ranger is one piece and big enough even for someone my size to get through.

Fire safety is a big issue, I used to be in the Royal Navy and was on board the Invincible when she had a serious engine room fire. Scary stuff as on a ship the priority is to save the ship rather than individual lives (because everyone on board depends on the ship to keep them alive)

 

[Guest]

I agree with the first 2 posters. I also used to work in the oil industry and certainly in the UK, they take safety very seriously, not so much overseas though. I worked for a while in Kuala Lumpur and as I was the HSE Officer as well for my sins, I arranged a fire drill from the office on the 13th floor. Getting all the people to use the stairs, not the lifts was just the start and then we all arrived at the fire escape door to find a complete street kitchen blocking the exit. It was cleared by the office owners, but re-appeared a few days later.

What the Heck? I figured out my own best way of escape.

The important thing in any fire is to get the Hell out as quickly as possible and forget about being a hero with the fire extinguisher. Get as far away as possible and watch it burn. You have insurance for that sort of thing.

 

[Steve L]

I quite agree with you SL.

Get out and stay out is definately the right attitude to have. But you may need to use the extinguisher to buy you a few seconds to let the family out first.

William might want to re-think about using the front window as that is directly over the gas locker.

On oxy acetylene bottles there used to be what us engineers called blow back arrestors. That is to say that if the flame reversed back up the pipe the blow back arrestor stopped it reaching the gas bottle. I might be wrong, but I can't see any built into our caravan gas regulators. That might be a good safety feature to have.

It might sound daft to a lot of people, but having a clear plan of what to do in an emergencey realy does save lives. Here's a few tips.

1/ Know the post code of the caravan sight or it's GPS map reference and the telephone contact number.

2/ Have your mobile phone with you at all times. If you and your partner have a phone each charge them at different times. That way one phone will have plenty of charge.

3/ Even if it's just a passing conversation, let the site warden know you are leaving site. For example, " We're off to Falmouth for a shopping day today". He/she might just remember that if they have to do an emergencey evacuation head count.

4/ Find your nearest fire point on site and familiarise yourself and all your family with the site regulations regarding emergencies.

Regards

Steve L.

 

[Chrisbee]

Some very good advice given, however, I don't believe a head count is a worthwhile exercise on a campsite. Presumably the purpose would be to establish if anyone is trapped in the burning caravan? By the time it's known who is actually on site and needs accounting for as opposed to out for the day/popped to the village/walking the dog via the back gate etc, etc any caravan on fire will be a charred chassis.

Get out and well away, if you don't you'll be dead before help arrives.

 

[RogerL]

A headcount IS worthwhile - if someone is missing, the fire brigade will risk their own lives to try and find them - if no-one is missing they'll fight the fire in a different way.

 

[Chrisbee]

A headcount IS worthwhile - if someone is missing, the fire brigade will risk their own lives to try and find them - if no-one is missing they'll fight the fire in a different way.

Roger, my point is a headcount is only worthwhile if you know how many heads you should be counting. On most sites they haven't a clue how many people are actually on site at a given time. Even on a CL often the only indication that someone is there is the presence of the car, if it's missing did all the caravan occupants go off in it or is one still left in the caravan?

 

[Steve L]

Your quite right Roger, but by the same token Chrisse has a valid point too.

It would be exceptionally hard to over see people leaving site etc and to accomplish thta without be seen to be so obtrusive as to risk spoiling their holiday.

Also you are quite correct to state that the rescue services do value danger to life over property. I for one would certainly not want to put a rescuers life in danger, which is why I'm actively trying to raise the profile of this thread so that at least the contributers here can spread the be safe word to family and friends.

Regards

Steve L.