Antwerp Airport is mainly used for business flights and – as is the case at all airports – security standards are incredibly high. If the alarm sounds, the fire service team on call needs to be ready to extinguish any fire at every corner of the airport within 180 seconds. Thorough and realistic exercises are essential for the airport’s fire service. A few of the fire service members transformed three containers into a training area. This resulted in imitations of a plane, a kitchen and an office. The Head of Service Guy de Deckers and Station Chief Ludo Sels welcomed the FireWare team in the spring of 2011 and proudly showed off the containers.
What does the fire service do at the airport?
“The airport fire service consists of 22 people who work in three teams of seven, ensuring the airport is manned from 06-30 am to 23-00 pm. Three people are available in the help centre at any one time. One person will man the control room and the others will be working in the garage and workshop and they will be responsible for the first turnout. Two others carry out tasks within the airport site and this team will organise the second turnout in case of an alarm. The fire service is certainly also a jack of all trades and make sure the runway remains clear of snow and ice.”
How did the idea for training containers come about?
“Being well prepared for possible calamities is absolutely essential. We used to practice by setting things on fire in iron buckets. This resulted in a great deal of air pollution and nuisance and was less realistic. We therefore started looking at other airports’ training areas and attended one of FireWare’s training procedures with simulated fire. These visits were very inspiring.”
What kind of fire are you working with now?
“We eventually decided to work with real fire, but not gas-fired. This is how we ended up with FireWare’s fire pastes and gel. These work perfectly. We use the pastes to fill up pots and light these in various different places. You can very easily rub the gel into large surface areas. You can even burn an entire ceiling with it.”
How did you discover FireWare?
“We discovered them via the internet a few years ago. We are now using a variety of their products, like drag dolls, smoke machines, blaze spots and fire pastes. One of the nice things about FireWare is the transparent and non-pushy way of doing business. All the product prices are provided on the website, ensuring you know exactly what you can expect beforehand. They also thought along with us regarding our containers and provided excellent advice. They were enthusiastic and had no problem with the fact we wanted to build the containers ourselves.”
How did you build the containers?
“Our major advantage is our large service team, as this is full of handy and helpful people. They are now professional firefighters, but many of them were once trained as welders, construction workers and mechanics. The training airplane includes seats from a real airplane. All measurements are the same as in a Fokker 50, as it’s important to practice with realistic measurements. The front of the container already has an airplane nose and will soon also have real wings. We are already in receipt of them, they are ready and waiting, just need to be assembled.”
