2009 Issues

May/June 2009
COVER STORY: UNITED AGAINST FIRE
BY ANTON RIECHER

Industrial emergency responders worldwide gathered in Beaumont, TX, in March to exchange opinions, ideas and information during the 24th annual Industrial Fire World Emergency Responder Conference & Exposition.

March/April 2009
COVER STORY: FALSE SECURITY
BY ANTON RIECHER

The Department of Homeland Security proposes to regulate security at gasoline storage facilities under standards designed to protect chemical plants from terrorism. Key trade associations oppose the move.

January/February 2009
COVER STORY: TOO CLOSE TO JUDGE?
BY ANTON RIECHER

How much authority does a safety officer wield in the incident command system during an industrial emergency? Some safety officers believe their authority is absolute. Many incident commanders disagree.

2008 Issues

November/December 2008
COVER STORY: HAZARDOUS EXPOSURE
BY ANTON RIECHER

An unreported hazmat incident at a packaging plant involving nitroaniline sent eight workers to four St. Louis hospitals, shutting down the major emergency rooms at two of those facilities for nearly a full day.

September/October 2008
COVER STORY: FRIENDLY FIRE
BY ANTON RIECHER

Firefighters attended the annual Industrial Fire School at Texas A&M University in College Station to test themselves against the newest fire ‘prop,’ a replicia of an industrial process unit that boasts 18 duel fuel-leak points.

July/August 2008
COVER STORY:TRIBUTE TO A FIREFIGHTER
BY ANTON RIECHER

Some final words of wisdom from Chief Jerry Craft of Williams Fire & Hazard Control who died in May from a sudden illness. His diverse resume includes battling one of the worst refinery fires on record in the United States.

May/June 2008
COVER STORY:BITTER SWEET
BY ANTON RIECHER

On February 7, 2008, a massive explosion and fire at a sugar refinery northwest of Savannah, GA, caused 13 deaths and left others critically injured with burns. The blast was likely fueled by combustible sugar dust.

March/April 2008
COVER STORY:ACCESS ZERO
BY ANTON RIECHER

An offloading mishap involving naphtha put nearly 640,000 gallons of solvents stored in Valley Center, KS, in peril in July 2007. The tank farm burned nearly 14 hours before local emergency responders managed to extinguish it.

January/February 2008
COVER STORY:TANK 15 IS BURNING
BY ANTON RIECHER

In July 2007, a passing lightning storm ignited a storage tank containing 1.5 million gallons of xylene at a New Jersey refinery. A joint task force from three area Sunoco refineries extinguished the fire with minimum product loss.

2007 Issues

November/December 2007
COVER STORY: VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE
BY MIKE PENCE & BOB BURNS

Workers navigate a fuel flooded dike to shut off key valves during an August 1975 refinery fire in Philadelphia that killed eight firefighters. The fire was only one of many refinery fires that haunted the city in the 1960s and 1970s.

September/October 2007
COVER STORY: ASSEMBLING YOUR APPARATUS
By Anton Riecher

Industrial fire chiefs have some strong opinions about what kind of fire apparatus and equipment they should have and what it should be capable of when needed.

July/August 2007
COVER STORY: SHELTER FROM THE STORM
By Anton Riecher

Hurricane Rita made landfall near Lake Charles, LA, in September 2005, dramatically affecting seven refineries amounting to 1.7 million barrels per day of U.S. refinery capacity.

May/June 2007
COVER STORY: FOAM & OTHER AGENTS

Foam and dry chemical are used to bring under control an LNG fire demonstration during the IFW Emergency Responder Conference.

March/April 2007
COVER STORY: TRAINING Where To Find What You Need

In its March-April 2005 issue, Industrial Fire World published a thorough listing of North American fire schools offering courses of interest to industrial emergency responders. In an effort to keep that list current IFW has offered those schools a chance to update their listings.

January/February 2007
COVER STORY: WITCH’S BREW
By Anton Riecher

Within two hours of a hazardous waste transfer facility catching fire in Apex, N.C., emergency responders were forced to close the city’s 911 call center, town hall and two of three fire stations due to toxic smoke spreading through the community of 32,000 people.

2006 Issues

November/December 2006
COVER STORY: BUNCEFIELD - ONE YEAR LATER
By David White

In December 2005, the Buncefield oil storage terminal in the U.K. exploded and burned. Firefighters faced a situation where incident command decisions were beyond their control. Was attempting to extinguish the blaze a wasted effort? Who should have been in charge?

September/October 2006
COVER STORY: FIRE TRUCK REVIEW
By Anton Riecher

Attendees at Industrial Fire World’s Conference & Exposition in Baton Rouge got a look at the best in specialized apparatus available to fire brigades in plants and factories worldwide.

July/August 2006
COVER STORY: LIGHTNING LOVES HYDROCARBON
By Anton Riecher

The lightning strike that ignited 120,000 barrels of gasoline in a storage tank at Glenpool, OK, may never have touched the metal itself, says Dwight Williams

May/June 2006
COVER STORY: BIG GUN SHOOTOUT
By Anton Riecher

Louisiana’s Hired Gun Gang made fire fighting history once again in March when the organization set a new world’s record — 30,966 gallons per minute — for water delivered through high capacity monitors during a training exercise.

March/April 2006
COVER STORY: CERTIFICATION CHALLENGE
By LEE KADERLI

In the future any skills that firefighters claim to have are going to have to be proven on the training field. Texas A&M University has taken a lead position on the issue.

January/February 2006
COVER STORY: DARK SKIES OVER ENGLAND
By Kevin Westwood

On Dec. 11, 2005, what has been described as the worst peacetime explosion in U.K. rocked the Buncefield oil storage depot north of London. The raging fire that followed consumed 17 storage tanks and took three days to extinguish.

2005 Issues

November/December 2005
COVER STORY: UNWELCOMED VISITORS
By Anton Riecher

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita shut down or reduced capacity at oil refineries and chemical plants throughout Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama with 20 percent of U.S. oil refinery capacity still affected in mid-October.

September/October 2005
COVER STORY: FORT WORTH FIREBALL
By Anton Riecher

With fireballs rising 200 feet into the sky, Fort Worth firefighters decided their best move at a July chemical plant fire was to protect the few exposures they could reach but otherwise do nothing.