ISO firefighters PPE meetings have officially started with a welcome from Deputy Chief Ono Osamu of the Tokyo Fire Department.
The first meeting of the busy agenda concerned ISO 11999-3, the clothing part of the ensemble standard for PPE used by firefighters who are at risk of exposure to high levels of heat and/or to the flame while fighting fires in structures.
Brett will be updating us during his trip with daily blogs. You can read his first blog on our PPE and Clothing page here:
This standard is undergoing a significant transition during the review process, whereby it is moving from two levels of performance to a singular level. As a result, there have been over 60 pages of comments received from the international delegates. There appears to be a 50/50 split of opinion on whether the new revision should be set at the lower level or high level of performance, with the UK’s position being for the higher level, which is nearer the current level of performance to ensure that firefighter safety is maintained. In addition, in-depth discussions surrounding the requirement for particulate protection currently don’t exist within the standard.
The result has seen the need for some compromise to ensure that consensus is achieved so that the standard can progress. Whilst this may not suit all, these are minimum performance requirements, and each Service will be able to specify any higher requirement they may require as a result of their individual risk assessments.
It has been proposed that the agreed discussions be captured into a further draft document and circulated for comment ahead of the next scheduled meeting in June.
This afternoon’s session has been related to ISO 11999-4, Gloves. Thankfully only six pages of comments to go through, mainly related to editorial changes rather than technical comments.
Tomorrow’s two sessions are on Firehoods and Cleaning, Inspection and Repair.