Two TEEX pros provide guidance for developing training programs and choosing a certification or noncertification approach.
In-plant emergencies are stressful for everyone involved, including those in the surrounding communities. Although they are infrequent for most industrial fire chiefs, once is enough. Some of the questions that run through your mind as you are en route to a facility during an emergency are:
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Did everyone get out of the area safely?
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Has the brigade started taking offensive/defensive action?
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Has the brigade’s training been adequate to help them face the situation safely and effectively?
It seems as if the trip to the plant takes an eternity. You always fear that knowledge gained during training won’t be accessible during a time of high anxiety. As you approach the plant you see master streams protecting exposures; the flare is roaring, indicating that the unit involved is shutting down and the fire is contained in a small area. The team has done its job and all is well. Such success is only possible if they’ve learned proper procedures and had good training. Without proper training, mass chaos reigns at an emergency response scene.
Choosing a Response Approach
Your company’s management will establish a written policy outlining employee responsibilities and actions to be taken during emergencies. That decision will dictate the type of training program your company must establish to ensure that employees are properly trained in the duties expected of them. You basically have four options:
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Mass evacuation: Employees are trained to report emergencies and are trained in the proper evacuation routes and rally points.
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Incipient-level response: Selected employees are trained to respond to small incipient-type fires that can be extinguished safely with fire extinguishers and hand line of less than 125 gallons per minute.
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Train everyone to the incipient level.
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Train a brigade: Develop an exterior- and interior-level response team that is organized and trained to respond to emergencies and perform offensive and defensive tactics.
The first three options seem the most attractive. They are the least expensive and have the smallest impact on overtime and your training budget. But you must take into consideration other factors: the possible loss of plant equipment, downtime, and off-site impact that may occur while waiting for the local fire department to respond to your emergency.
With option four, your employees are trained in offensive and defensive tactics and can better protect personnel, property, the community, and the environment. Yes, option four costs money and requires upper management’s commitment. But it all boils down to doing what you say and saying what you do. If you choose to have an industrial fire brigade, you will need to follow the guideline of OSHA 29 CFR 1910.156 and NFPA 600.
The key elements of a successful training plan are the right type, amount, and frequency of training. These three elements should be incorporated in your Emergency Response Organizational Statement, which is required by OSHA 29 CFR 1910.156. This standard is the driving force behind mandated annual live, hands-on fire training for industrial brigades. NFPA 600/1081/1041/1006/472 should also be closely examined when you are looking at what job performance requirements and functional roles your team will be expected to perform.
Establishing a Training Plan
Once you’ve established your industrial fire brigade, you’ll have to answer these questions:
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How will we train?
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What topics will we cover?
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When we will conduct training and drills?
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Where will training take place?
How will we train? Most petrochemical plants and refineries were not made using a cookie cutter approach, to say the least. Each site has unique equipment, processes, and hazards that should be addressed in your training plan.
As always, it’s critical that your training consist of real, hands-on situations. You can cover regulatory requirements, the chemistry of fire, foam applications, and other similar topics in a classroom setting. But you must take those fundamentals out of the classroom and onto the field. Remember to keep your focus on life safety.
Determining the type, amount, and frequency of training is also part of answering the “how” question. And you’ll need to decide how the industrial fire brigade fits into the company’s emergency response plan. Your organizational chart should include functional roles and responsibilities.
What topics will we cover? The best guide to follow when trying to determine what topics to address will be the associated NFPA guidelines. You can look at NFPA 1081 for fire fighting, NFPA 1006 for rescue, and NFPA 472 for hazmat response. These guidelines include job performance requirements (JPRs) for each discipline. These JPRs will address topics that will cover basic requirements for each discipline. Even if you choose NFPA certification for your industrial fire brigade, you will still need to address subjects that may be unique to your facility and the makeup of your brigade.
When will we conduct training and drills? The only way to make a team more proficient and better diversified in their duties is through training and drills. Both training and drills should be conducted in a controlled environment and be designed to provide new or additional information. The frequency and duration of training should correspond to what is in the organizational statement. Training and drills should be of sufficient duration and frequency so that team members can demonstrate proficiency in their skills and expected duties.
Where will training take place? Whatever training service provider (or in-house training) you choose, you should ensure that your site-specific hazards are met during training evolutions. Thus, if you have flammable liquids and liquefied petroleum gas in your facility, you should train on both. The same holds true for rescue (confined space and high angle), hazmat, and medical services. You should also make sure that the training service provider is creditable — someone who could be an asset during OSHA audits or similar situations.
Certification or Noncertification?
Once you’ve answered the four planning questions satisfactorily, you’ll need to decide if NFPA certification- or noncertification-based training is better for your company. For years we have relied on training based upon what we thought was right for our team; it may or may not have addressed basic life safety needs and basic skill sets. All NFPA certification classes, on the other hand, are designed to ensure that all basic needs (that is, life safety issues) are covered. NFPA certification-based training can be considered a road map of best practices to follow when training an industrial brigade.
Certification-based training offers some distinct benefits. Many industrial-type companies are members of the Voluntary Protection Programs (VPP) and Responsible Care initiative, and they all have insurance underwriters. Certification-based training can benefit you with regard to these affiliations and obligations because such training is conducted to a known and recognized standard. It is also conducted by an accredited organization that has met stringent requirements. All of these factors can provide you with persuasive arguments to convince your management that certification is beneficial for your industrial brigade.
Another benefit of certification-based training is that everyone is trained to meet basic fundamentals of a given discipline. This becomes critical when you consider mutual aid response and the mixing of responders from different companies. If you have certified firefighters, rescue technicians, or hazmat responders, you can be assured that they were trained to worldwide recognized standards, trained to meet basic requirements, performed measurable skill-based exercises, and passed both written and skill-based testing.
Ultimately, your company has to decide how to train its emergency response teams; however, it is everyone’s responsibility to ensure that training meets current standards and requirements. Both traditional brigade training and certification-based training are options you should explore. Whatever option you choose, remember that you must adhere to the written plan of action and your team’s needs.