Fareham Solid Recovered Fuel Facility Sprinkler Activation

• Fire Rescue Service; Hampshire & Isle of wight
• Incident; fire involving, Machine plant within building 80m X 60m
• When; 14 August 2022
• Time of call; 10:59
• Where, Warren Farm, Fareham
• Use of premises; Solid Recovered Fuel, Recycling
• Automatic fire suppression System; Sprinkler

Hampshire & Isle of wight fire and rescue service have reported the above-mentioned incident resulting in the activation of the premises industrial sprinkler system

Background

• The solid recovered fuel facility handling bulky materials from the household waste. recycling centre network that currently goes to landfill, as well as commercial waste.
• Which is too large for kerbside collections or to be delivered to energy recovery facilities
• The site contains a combination of mechanical equipment including a trommel, belt magnet, air separator, allowing a range of products for recycling and recovery so landfill is avoided.

Incident

• 3 x Pump fire with pumping appliances, 1x Water carrier, 1x Environmental protection unit attending from local stations including Fareham, Portchester and Cosham
• Fire within a plant bailing machine involving waste materials on conveyor belt
• Industrial sprinkler system activated
• Incident was handed over to site management at 13:48 hours

Sprinkler system

• Water supply, town mains
• Contained/controlled the fire, before the arrival of the fire rescue service
• 2X Fire Sprinkler heads actuated

 Benefits of the sprinkler system 

• Rapidly reduced the rate of production of heat and smoke allowing the fire service crucial time to implement their operational tactical plan
• Fire damage was limited to the area in the vicinity of the seat of the fire

 Firefighting media

• On arrival operational crews wearing breathing apparatus used hose reel, jet to extinguish the fire before ventilating the building using ventilation fans to clear the smoke

Business Continuity

• This incident clearly demonstrates the importance of protecting waste, recycling centres with automatic fire suppression systems
• Preventing a minor small fire from accelerating into a major fire with only minor disruption o the facility
• Business interruption, less than 3 hours a previous incident on site took over 7 hours to extinguish requiring the attendance of 6 pumping appliances, 3 water carriers sprinklers were not present
• Severe damage, loss of earnings and ongoing disruption to the business was avoided
• If sprinklers were not fitted the outcome of the fire could have resulted in the buildings unit being either completely or partially destroyed

Links

• BAFSA, Fire Data reports, provide a detailed analysis of compound data1 on fire incidents in Great Britain where sprinklers systems were reported over the period of 2018/19 to 2020/21.
• Hampshire & Isle of Wight Fire & Rescue Service; Incident of interest report