News
Estimated 3,675 die from fire in the U.S. in 2005
The American National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) has released a study on August 1 illustrating the number of people who die from fire in the USA.
The study estimated that approximately 3,675 people die each year from fire (almost one every 2.5 hours).
While I can't currently find similar figures for Australia, there is quite a lot of information available from each of the fire authorities around the country.
Rag & Tag is alive & well in the USA
Well it seems the phrase Rag and Tag is universal when it comes to portable fire extinguisher service.
Today while talking to some US counterparts the topic of poor and sloppy fire extinguisher maintenance came up.
It soon became apparent that the issues we face in Australia also exist in the United States. In fact they use the exact same phrase as us to describe the shoddy service.
The funny thing is that GREAT service only takes a couple of extra minutes per fire extinguisher... Who are these technicians/companies kidding????
The problem stems from a number of things including; the per unit service rates that contractors are paid for their service, poor training and the idea that shortcuts are acceptable..
Fire Australia 2006 - Melbourne
November 1-3 2006 - Fire Australia 2006 will be held in Melbourne during the Spring Racing Carnival. The theme for the conference will be Sporting, Entertainment and Leisure Facilities – How do we make them fire safe?
The focus of this conference is particularly relevant as it is held the week before the famous Melbourne Cup racing carnival and it is the year Melbourne plays host to the Commonwealth Games.
This major fire event is expected to attract delegates and visitors from all states of Australia, the Asia Pacific, New Zealand, United States of America, United Kingdom and Europe.
NFPA Seminar: Fire Protection Systems Maintenance
Today I attended the first day in a two day seminar on Fire Protection Systems Maintenance. There were a number of highlights but one in particular has important ramifications for the Australian Standards..
One of my bug bears has been the lack of control and integrity testing of changes made to the software inside a modern (addressable) fire alarm panel.
The NFPA standards have addressed this in the National Fire Alarm Code 72 (NFPA-72:2002).
Infrastructure Australia 2006 Exhibition
__October 5-7, 2006__ - The Infrastructure Australia 2006 Exhibition will provide a platform for exhibitors to showcase their products and services and bring together leading projects from Australia that deal with Infrastructure in some shape or form.
