TYPES OF EMERGENCY SITUATIONS

Emergency situation for a facility and its operations may be described as a hazardous situation which requires action to control, correct and return the site to a safe condition and also requires timely action to protect people, property and the environment from harm.

TYPES OF EMERGENCY SITUATIONS

► Industrial disasters are disasters caused by chemical mechanical, civil, electrical or other processes failures due to an accident, negligence or in competence in an industrial plant which may spill over to the areas outside the plant or within causing damage to life property & environment

► Chemical Disasters are occurrence of emission, fire or explosion involving one or more hazardous chemicals in the course of industrial activity (handling) storage or transportation or due to the natural events leading to serious effects inside or outside the installation likely to cause loss of life & property including adverse effect on the environment

► A chemical accident or emergency refers to an event which r results in the release of a substance hazardous to human health and /or the environment, i.e. short term or long term. These events can cause illness, injury, disability or death to human beings, often in large numbers & can result in the extensive damage to the environment with considerable human & economic costs

Examples of types of emergencies are:

    - fire (including generation of toxic combustion products)

   - explosion (including BLEVE)

   - spill (of hazardous solids & liquids)

   - gas leak (flammable, toxic, asphyxiant, pressurized or refrigerated liquid)

   - structural failure

   - natural event (including earth quake, storms, tides etc)

Factors contributing to the emergency situation

• ·          Characteristics of the chemicals used
• ·         Storage conditions of the  raw materials
• ·         Equipment failure
• ·         Lack of awareness on the msds &emergency preparedness plans
• ·         Lack of involvement on the periodical testing of emergency
• ·         Preparedness plan

LEVEL OF EMERGENCY

► There is no direct correlation between the size of a release & scale of emergency

► Eg: A small release of chlorine gas may affect the people outside the boundary of the facility and can be categorized as an external emergency

► A large release of an alkali that  is contained within a bunded area could be classified as a local

► LOCAL EMERGENCY : is an emergency where the impacts on people, property &environment are expected to be confined to a specific location within the facility and no escalation is expected  eg: ruptured drum in ware house, leaking flange or seal, small fire in a bag store .

► SITE EMERGENCY: is an emergency where the impacts on people, property & environment are expected to be confined to spread or affect all parts of the facility but not off site

► EXTERNAL EMERGENCY: An emergency where the impacts on people, property & environment are expected to impact within the facility & beyond the boundary of the facility eg: bomb threat, a large tank bund fire, BLEVE of a large liquefied gas storage, toxic gas release, transport incident