Editorial Opinion
Silver Lining To Umicore Fire
January 13,
2009
Remember the old saying that "Every cloud
has a silver lining"? Well, we think
the fire at Umicore Sunday afternoon has
the proverbial silver lining.
First of all
we should all be thankful that it turned
out to be a relatively small fire with no
injuries and with only moderate damage to
the building and equipment.
Preliminary findings point to a possible
electrical short in overhead lighting
within the building that ignited a pallet
of shipping bags, creating a lot of smoke
and damaging some equipment.
While everyone
would rather never have a real life test
of any emergency response system, the fact
is that real life crises do occur.
That is why the seventeen agencies that
responded to the Umicore fire do extensive
prior planning and hold drills and
practice scenarios on a regular basis.
In fact Arab hosted just such a drill a
few months back. Although the
"Operation Green Nitro" drill involved
tanker trucks instead of a manufacturing
plant the rest of the scenario was very
similar.
Companies such
as Umicore also drill and train for
incidents that are specific to their
operations.
The truth is
that with all of the planning and
practice, emergency responders can only
simulate a incident to a certain level.
During a drill there is always the
realization that the incident is not real
so it is difficult to experience the
adrenalin rush of a real situation and
assess how it will affect performance and
reactions.
The real
silver lining in the Umicore fire is that
the planning, training and drills paid
off. As the first responders to the
fire call were making their way to the
scene they were already anticipating their
response. Once on scene they make a
quick, but professional assessment of the
situation and initiated the mutual
aid plan for such an event..
Within minutes
help was on the way from surrounding fire
departments, EMA, utility companies and
several other agencies. In the end,
at least 17 agencies had equipment and
personnel on the scene performing various
task or ready to relieve those already
working.
At the same
time Umicore staff and management
officials were working with the incident
command center to provide information
about the chemicals housed in the building
and were assisting with access to the
facilities.
As a
precaution, eleven families located
downwind from the plant were evacuated.
The families heeded the warning and acted
quickly to leave their homes until given
the all clear. Their quick actions
made the jobs of the emergency personnel
easier.
The bottom
line is that the system worked exactly as
it was supposed to and it worked quickly.
We owe a huge
thank you to everyone who responded to the
incident.
Thanks to the
Guntersville, Albertville, Boaz, 4-C,
Union Grove, and Brindlee Mountain Fire
Departments who were the frontline
responders either directly fighting the
fire or ready to step in when called upon.
Thanks to
Marshall County EMA, Arab and Guntersville
Police and Arab Rescue Squad, Marshall
Health System EMS, Arab Electric Co-Op,
Marshall County Gas, American Red Cross,
Marshall County 211 for the on scene
support of the firefighters.
A special
thanks to the Marshall County 911 staff
who had a monumental task in coordinating
communications and notification of the
various agencies.
Thanks to the
families for their co-operation in quickly
evacuating their homes for the short time
necessary to assure their safety.
Public co-operation is vitally important
in any emergency as it allows the
emergency crews to quickly perform their
jobs and may save lives.
And last but
equally important, thanks to the Umicore
staff and management for being well
prepared with MSDS information on all of
the chemicals in the building and for
being totally open and co-operative with
firefighters.
Let's hope we
don't have another real test for a long
time, but if we do we can feel confident
that our emergency response agencies and
our neighbors will be ready to respond.
