TT$33,000,000 in Fire Equiptment PNM Propaganda

SiR8081 · Postby **SiR8081** » May 13th, 2010, 8:51 pm

so they bought 33M in fire equipment. did they tell you that the fire hydrants have no water. but wait did they also tell you that when wasa arrives on the scene to turn on the water to full pressure that the hydrants are still dry!!!!!! they not working?????????? and is only when the building already burn down the ground that wasa comes later in the week to dig up the newly paved road that we having been begging them to pave for the past 7yrs to fix the fire hydrant? sooooooo they pave the road just before elections and wasa fixes the hydrant after the fire AND digs up the road, not to mention the wasa booster station for the area is right by the el socorro lights on the southern side of the highway

believe me i have experience from the fire at ABC, NWT, Auto Village and Marine Consultants warehouse

did they also tell you that the firemen on scene when they need foam/powder they need permission from the chief fire officer and b/c it's expensive they only use it when it's already too late?

they brought foam 24hrs after the fire when the building was already gutted and destroyed the night before

did they also tell you that the only place in trinidad and tobago with foam equipment are located at the 2 airports and they dont have any foam/powder equipment otherwise and the equipment is not allowed to leave the airports for any reason at all. which i understand

during the fire, when the firemen ran out of water, they could do nothing but watch the fire burn and wait on wasa trucks. we even had to hire private contractors to bring water and their service is far superior to WASA's service

i understand that no one can predict a drought but dont fool the people with fire equipment when we have no water, foam or powder

and wasa does not use potable water for fires, they use river water. in our case, water from the st joseph river where they fill by the maracas st joseph bridge

Terran · Postby **Terran** » May 13th, 2010, 10:46 pm

Yeah... umm... they also want to build 6 hospitals in Tobago and they haven't even finished the Scarborough Hospital.

ravi4001 · Postby **ravi4001** » May 14th, 2010, 6:17 am

great is the pnm

SiR8081 · Postby **SiR8081** » May 14th, 2010, 10:24 am

Terran wrote:Yeah... umm... they also want to build 6 hospitals in Tobago and they haven't even finished the Scarborough Hospital.

scarborough hospital is another brian lara stadium/desalination plant/udecott

brickman · Postby **brickman** » May 14th, 2010, 11:23 am

Last year floods locked down p.o.s,cause of badly maintained drainage,has any of this been taken care of since with rainy season right there?The broken hydrants are still broken so crapaud smoke they pipe next big fire breaks out.Nobody taking responsibilty for these things,ministry passes it to some council who passes it to another ministry & the circle starts again.Two main hospitals that cant be properly run but they want to build 6 more!?Chinee man get plenty wok now!

Rutless Tiida · Postby **Rutless Tiida** » May 14th, 2010, 10:01 pm

^^ well actually I saw just this week the POS city corp. cleaning drains in POS. (at least local government is working, for now)

Terran · Postby **Terran** » May 14th, 2010, 10:21 pm

I wonder why. Is there the threat that they would lose their jobs?

brickman · Postby **brickman** » May 15th, 2010, 12:35 am

Election time,what you expect.Everything is spit & shine now.

Postby **NorStar2K** » May 15th, 2010, 1:51 am

SiR8081, not to be the devil's advocate here, and this has nothing to do with any political affiliation. But......

What preparations and procedures were in place to detect, manage and control, in the event of an industrial fire? I'm referring to your reference to "experience from the fire at ABC, NWT, Auto Village and Marine Consultants warehouse".

The TT Fire Service is limited in many ways, but according to the OSH Act, companies have a legal "First Responder" role. Companies have a legal obligation to have in place Emergency Response Plans which include measures for detecting, managing and controlling (fighting) fires.

If you have a team trained in fire response (extinguishers and hose systems); a fire suppression system (sprinklers); fire doors, etc. in place, property loss should be minimum. When the TTFS arrives, they take over and control spread.

Many of the buildings and even homes that burn, don't have to 'suffer' total structural loss due to fire/water damage if early warning and response measures/procedures were in place.

By design without proper risk assessments and (commercial/industrial) zoning, or HAZCOM, we place commercial entities (e.g. paint/chemicals/other flammables) in residential areas without the proper infrastructure and when there's a fire there is a total loss of not only the 'factory/plant' but homes also.

TT OSH Act 2004 (2006 Amended)

Part II: General Duties
8(2)(b)(ii). measures and procedures to be used to control a major fire, to react to serious damage to the industrial establishment, to evacuate the industrial establishment and
to notify rescue personnel,

Part 5. Fire
29. In every industrial establishment there shall be provided, maintained and kept readily available for use appropriate fire equipment approved by the fire authority for fighting fire and the occupier shall ensure that a sufficient number of persons trained in using such equipment are available........

As for the foam retardant, foam is typically used in aviation fires/aircraft crash rescue (hence it is stored/located at the airports), and the petro-chemical fires. It is expensive and isn't environmentally friendly.

The TTFS can't be everywhere at every-time; we do need more stations and better equipment but they aren't the 'only' ones to 'blame'.

Postby **M_2NR** » May 15th, 2010, 2:55 am

norstar2k, fix yuh sig nah boy :lol:

but excellent stuff buddy.

WRT to the scarborough hospital, all i will say is ell ohh ell.

BTW when they releasing the Uff Report?

Terran · Postby **Terran** » May 15th, 2010, 7:49 am

Do a search in the ole talk forums. The links were posted there.

SiR8081 · Postby **SiR8081** » May 15th, 2010, 4:48 pm

norstar2k

good stuff man, can you send me a link to the entire osha act?

fire service work without a doubt was outstanding. they arrived in >8mins however no water. i am blaming wasa here for hydrant with no water and the gov't for trying to fool us with their flamboyancy that a few fire trucks just not good enough to fight fire.

give the men on the scene the authority and all the tools. a fireman's main resource is water. it cheap and available.

we can have as many firemen as we want, as man trucks and as many stations as we want but i will quote one fire officer who was on the scn

"One fire truck supplied by a fully functioning hydrant could have done so much"

Postby **M_2NR** » May 15th, 2010, 7:33 pm

Terran wrote:Do a search in the ole talk forums. The links were posted there.

nah i meant officially :lol:

I know it's there. Or will they ever do that?

FriendlyFire · Postby **FriendlyFire** » May 16th, 2010, 6:57 pm

Election propagander yes but the logic in your example seems a bit convoluted and flawed.

Some of the trucks purchased seemed to be water tankers which carry a large supply of water. The benifit of this is that firefighters won't have to depend on the hydrants which we all agree are often dry. It is definately a stop gap measure but perhaps a necessary one under the current circumstances. Blaming WASA's inefficiency and governments failings is fine but it doesen't make sense to also find fault in the possible solutions to those inefficiencies.

It would be good if we can seperate propaganda from progress.

The purchase of the equipment was a good thing. They would have been ordered long before the election was called.

Trying to use the purchase to gain political points whilst avoiding the failings which necessitated the purchase in the first place is what is bad.