Safety in Every Spark: Navigating the Essentials of Fire Prevention

Fire safety is a set of procedures plan to reduce the chances of occurrence of fire and to minimize the destruction caused by fire. These set of cautions are measures taken to prevent or diminish the probability of fire that may result in fatality, injury, or property damage.

Threats to fire safety are commonly known as Fire Hazards. A Fire can take place at any time be it in an industrial area or non-industrial area such as residential buildings, hospitals, hotels, commercial compounds, educational institutions, warehouses, etc.

Causes of fire:

The main causes of fire at the workplace include:

• Electrical equipment: Mistreated or bare wiring can lead to short circuits which will eventually generate fire. Usage of substandard or poor quality electrical equipment is also one of the most prominent reason for fire.

• Combustible/ Flammable materials: Flammable liquid/gasses chalk up to fire if not used and stored properly.

• Lightning Arresters: Inappropriate installation of lightning arresters or other lightning equipment creates major fire hazards.

• Waste substances: Fire needs fuel. It is often seen that fire generally spreads quickly due to unwanted waste materials.  

• Smoking: Smoking in non-designated area and negligent disposal of cigarette butts and match sticks provides an opportunity to cause fire hazards.

• Employee training: If the employees are not trained to notice fire-related issues and take essential preventive measures, there is a high chance of fire hazards.

Fire prevention techniques

• Attainable equipment: All the fire protection equipment (Fire extinguishers, control panels, etc.) should always be kept in an easily reachable place.

• Timely inspection and maintenance: It is a good practice to do timely maintenance and inspection of electrical installations/ machinery and the fire safety equipment to verify that all the equipment are working properly.

• Regular waste disposal: Disposing of unwanted waste will prevent unnecessary issues that can lead to fire hazards. 

• Automatic Fire Suppression System (AFSS): It includes wet sprinklers, a gas suppression system, and water mist which will restrain the fire from spreading quickly.

• Proper storage: Flammable materials are to be stored in a secure and safe environment.

• Designated smoking area: A designated smoking area should be made for the proper disposal of cigarettes and matches. It is recommended to ban smoking in flammable working environments.

• Training and educating Employees: All the employees should be given industrial fire safety training which will give them all the information and techniques to mitigate/ prevent fire. This helps them to make appropriate decisions at the time of fire.

Importance of fire safety training

Workplace Fire safety training ensures that your employees have the skill to act in an event which involves fire. It also makes sure that your workers take necessary actions in an emergency that not only saves their lives but also the lives of everyone around them. 

As per the ADSI-2019 report, there were 11,037 fire accidents reported across the country in 2019. The number of such reported fire accidents fell by around 16% compared to 2018. The decline was more steeped compared to the year earlier, which was around 2%.

Fire Accidents in India (2015-2019)

Source: NCRB's ADSI Reports

The data available with us, clearly shows that fire accidents are diving in India. The companies are taking fire safety issues quite seriously now.

They know pretty well that the cost incurred by fire is not a joke.

An estimated 1000 crores are lost every year due to fire hazards at the workplace. 

Fire safety training is the best possible way to give appropriate knowledge and skills to prevent fire. As we all know fire will definitely hamper the operations of the business and are going to cost the company immensely.

So it is recommended to give proper offline or online fire safety training which not only saves lives but also prevents unnecessary expenses to the company. 

There are plenty of resources available, which will give the employees ample amount of detailed information on fire safety. Safety animation videos can present all the fire related scenarios easily for a better understanding of employees.