OFFSHORE FIREFIGHTING PRACTITIONERS' SEMINAR
30 JUNE 1999 - LINCOLN

Representaives from nineteen UK coastal Fire Brigades, SAR organisations, MCA and the Home Office attended the first 'practioners' meeting held at Lincolnshire Fire Brigade Headquarters, Lincoln. The following is an overview of that meeting:-

1. HM Coastguard -
An explanation of the current and recent changes within HM Coastguard were outlined by Geoff Roberts who is Principal Officer Aviation and Operational Liaison. The Coastguard has been merged with the Maritime Safety Agency (MCA) and is now known as the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. Although a number of changes have resulted from this the major changes which are of interest involve those at Operations Room level.

There are now four regions for HM Coastguard controllers, i.e. South, West, East and Scottish. The Regional Controller and Deputy Regional Controller posts have now gone and the administrative work of the regions is being dealt with by a Regional Manager who will take no part in the operational work of the region. The Deputy Regional Controller, now known as the Regional Inspector, is the most senior Regional Officer operationally. Because of the small numbers of Regional Inspectors there is no guarantee of 100% availability of the individuals in each Region and duty is shared with other Regional Inspectors. East shares with West. In the South, Dover shares with Falmouth and in Scotland Clyde shares with Aberdeen.

It should be taken into account that on some occasions a Fire Officer may be talking to a Regional Inspector who is overseeing an incident from a very remote location. However, the level of operational management will be improved with the introduction of Principal Counter-Pollution and Salvage Officers (PCPSO's), one of which will be attached to each region. These posts have been agreed and the new postholders will be appointed in the coming months.

These Officers will advise the Regional Manager on routine matters concerning pollution and salvage, and in times of major incident, will work directly to the Secretary of State's representative. The PCPSO's will come to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency with the knowledge of merchant shipping legislation, sea clean-up techniques, salvage operations, contingency planning in maritime emergency operations, plus strategic and tactical management techniques. Their duties at any one incident will include monitoring of counter-pollution resources within the national contingency plan. It will also include attendance on scene, where circumstances dictate, to protect UK interests from threat of pollution. They will assist the Secretary of State's representative in major counter-pollution incidents involving salvage, provide liaison with the DETR, work with ports, harbours and the offshore industry.

The Secretary of State's representative has been nominated as Robin Middleton, previously a Salvage Master, and will be based at the Marine and Coastguard Agency Headquarters in Southampton reporting directly to the Chief Executive. It will be his role to take control of any salvage operation where there is a threat of significant pollution, establish the salvage control unit to ensure that salvors have considered the implications of proposals and have appropriate resources to achieve the task. If the salvor is not considered capable, the Secretary of States representative is to influence, persuade or direct the ship owner to appoint alternative or additional salvors, take proper account of environmental information and other relevant factors in choosing between salvage operations, have arrangements in reserve for dealing with situations if the salvage plan goes wrong or a situation escalates in severity and exercise the Secretary of State's power of intervention under merchant shipping legislation.

It was also indicated that HM Coastguard's aircraft are going through a number of modifications to bring them up to date Of most relevance will be the installation on of a dual hoist arrangement following operational experience. It should also be noted that the Royal Air Force do have back-up hoists on their aircraft which gives added security to anyone using that facility.

Additional flight training time has been allocated to all SAR bases specifically for firefighting practice. This limited time should be used as carefully as possible to get the best value but additional time will be available through local discussion by taking advantage of the training regimes for the air crew in general. Geoff Roberts requested later that at future meetings of the Group feedback is provided on how these arrangements of training are operating.

It is hoped in the coming months HM Coastguard will produce videos that will assist in training by providing some information on helicopter usage etc.

2. Search and Rescue (SAR) -
Flight Lieutenant Simon Paterson, based at RAF Wattisham, provided some input on the SAR flight operations. He indicated some issues that he considered would benefit from agreement. First he highlighted the need for a standard operating procedure (SOP's) in terms of how Firefighters will board aircraft, types of loads, types of load carrying bags, training regimes etc. During discussion with those present it was agreed that some work could be carried out to arrange these standard operating procedures and prevent confusion and differing standards from Fire Brigades and from SAR flight operators. A number of instances were raised which highlighted that small operational differences do occur.

3. Case history 'Kukawa', December 1997 -
(see also 'Technical Papers' pages on this site)
Divisional Officer Mervyn Kettle from Cornwall County Fire Brigade presented a case study on the 'Kukawa' incident in Cornwall and openly discussed those points that had operated well and those that did not work so effectively during the incident. In particular, he highlighted the need for early information to be passed by Coastguard to Fire Brigades even if a response is not immediately requested, in order that pre-planning and information gathering can be carried out as early as possible. There have also been occasions where just the provision of advice without any operational intervention has proved extremely helpful when a ship is in difficulties. Mervyn stressed that whilst at sea operations on board ship concentrated purely on defensive firefighting and full offensive operations did not begin until the vessel had been brought into harbour.

He stressed that their experience underlined the limited ability of small firefighting teams sent to ships to undertake any duties beyond defensive firefighting.

4. Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Divisional Officer Peter Pearce from Kent led a session on PPE. He explained the different approaches that had evolved in Kent over the years and provided everyone with a view of the standard now being used in Kent. Kent are actively involved in considering all types of PPE for firefighting at sea. Essentially, at the moment, they have decided to use an immersion suit and a one piece firefighting suit, donning and removing the immersion suit at appropriate times during operations. He is undertaking some further research with regard to helmets and welcomed any feedback from anyone present that had already conducted some research.

With regard to lifejackets he explained that Kent had different equipment for aircraft transit, sea-going transit and for inshore incidents. He did indicate that they had highlighted some difficulties with the automatic operation of some lifejackets. This had been dealt with by their supplier and he strongly recommended that Brigades did test the units to ensure proper operation. This type of difficulty was supported by the experience of those from Cornwall.

5. Fire Brigades Union (FBU) policy document-
The last programmed session involved some discussion around the detail of the policy promoted by the Fire Brigades' Union with regard to offshore firefighting and transportation in helicopters. There are a number of these areas which are difficult to achieve practically and are not particularly clear in determining the intent of the policy item. Alan Riddet undertook to seek clarification from the F B U and had already written with some queries to the national Officer during April of 1999. Unfortunately, no reply had been received to date.

6. Open forum
The forum that ended the day identified there was broad agreement that the opportunity for Practitioners to meet was extremely positive and beneficial. It was agreed that the invitation to meet should be extended to other coastal Brigades as much of the material that was covered, and is likely to be covered, will be pertinent to ship firefighting whether at sea or in dock.

It was also agreed that the Group should meet at six monthly intervals with some attempt to pick venues that alleviated excessive travelling for as many people as possible.

The subjects that would be covered in the next meeting were suggested as being ;

1. A standard operating procedure for using helicopters. A draft SOP will be prepared by the representatives from Kent, Hampshire and Cornwall along with MoD and Coastguard. (This meeting is arranged for mid September in Hampshire) This should be circulated prior to the next meeting and will be discussed fully when everyone gets together.
2. Command and Control - Again, with a view to agreeing in principle some of the tactics that should be used and to generate as much as possible a common approach.
3. Communications - Following a conversation during the day it was highlighted that a common approach is not being taken in communications and the Group would benefit from some further consideration.
4. FBU Policy - It would be useful to highlight and clarify a number of items within the FBU policy document with regard to how they affect practical operations.

DCO Alan Riddett…Chair.

A vote of thanks was giving to Alan Riddett for organising and hosting this inaugral meeting.