Coordinated Solutions for Incidents

Quelle/credit: Melanie Waigand-Brauner/International Fire Academy

Two-sided attack is becoming the standard means of fighting fires in tunnels for many fire brigades. Entering from both portals increases the chance of being able to start fighting the fire immediately and thus considerably improves conditions for escape and rescue |

Quelle/credit: Melanie Waigand-Brauner/International Fire Academy

Quelle/credit: Martin Gruber, gb&t GmbH

Coordination between fire and ambulance services: In case of a fire in a twin-bore tunnel, when can an ambulance drive into the unaffected bore to care for injured victims? In order to ensure safe collaboration in case of an incident, this question should also be clarified in advance |

Quelle/credit: Martin Gruber, gb&t GmbH

Quelle/credit: International Fire Academy

Staff members work on the basis of information received from other emergency services, both at an incident and at an exercise (photo). Therefore staff exercises are ideal to train the leaders without having to call out all the crews for a full-scale exercise |

Quelle/credit: International Fire Academy

Quelle/credit: F. Embert-Kreiser

Coordination requires clear terms and descriptions. The lack of labelling of an extinguishing water hydrant led to lost time due to unnecessary searching for water. The information sign was then provided immediately |

Quelle/credit: F. Embert-Kreiser

What preconditions have to be provided to enable good coordination between tunnel operators and emergency services in case of an incident? This question occupied the 4^th Commanders Forum at the International Fire Academy in Balsthal, Switzerland. The most important subjects from the specialist lectures and the discussions of the fire service members with other involved emergency services, tunnel owners, contractors and engineers are collected in the following article.

Many aspects of dealing with incidents are fundamentally regulated in the EU Tunnel Directive. This alone is not sufficient, since both the assignment conditions and the technical and organisational capabilities of all involved parties, like tunnel operators, engineers, emergency services, supervisory authorities, safety officers and the police, can differ greatly. The early clarification of the following questions was seen as an essential precondition for effective coordination of fire fighting:

How are the defined tasks of all parties regulated?

With what tactics do the parties proceed and...