Track: Risk Assessment and Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)

Abstract

Fire is a primary threat to property and human safety in warehouses, and risk management of warehouse fires is challenging due to potential accident causes and various safety measures. Warehouse fires are caused by many factors such as the size of the buildings and the amount of stored combustible material. The size of the buildings and the volumes of combustible material held result in many of the fires becoming major conflagrations which pose challenges for fire and rescue services and result in significant property losses. Storage fires, like those in fuel storage facilities, can quickly spread to surrounding products, generate a number of secondary fires, resulting in conditions where accidents are uncontrollable, and severely destroy assets. The bowtie analysis approach was used in this paper for the industrial warehouse fire scenario. A generalized framework to manage warehouse fires was then developed followed by a general mitigation measure to control fires at industrial warehouses. A successful fire safety strategy is a thorough fire risk assessment that considers warehouse protection and life safety in compliance with national fire safety legislation. In the interests of developing a successful risk control program, an assessment will identify the fire threats and the potential for property losses and business interruption losses. The assessment should consider the structure of the building and the flammability of the products stored and the mode of storage.