There is a significantly low level of awareness on fire safety in Nigeria, with less than 2 percent of over 170 million Nigerians have basic fire safety knowledge according to the Fire Disaster Prevention and Safety Awareness Association of Nigeria (FDPSAAN).
This trend is worrisome due to its consequences on socio-economic life. The cost of fire incidents is obviously enormous. It results in pains and death of victims, waste of resources and damage to equipment and structures. In view of this, Proplus Integrators Limited – Nigeria and Securiton AG – Switzerland, organised a Fire Safety seminar in Lagos. The event was well attended from participants in the Oil & Gas, Energy companies, and ELV consultants in Lagos.
The event kicked off with an introductory speech by Benjamin Meke, director of products and technology, during which he questioned how much value Nigeria place on a human life, considering the spate of avoidable catastrophes in which scores of lives are terminated and billions of naira worth of goods and property destroyed due to fire incidents. He noted that in recent times, fire disasters particularly have become so incessant that it now occurs almost on a daily basis. In his view, the issue of safety which once occupied a major place in the programmes and plans of every level of government is now treated with levity. Within the context of Nigerian laws on safety, the National Fire Safety Code, for instance, seems to have been dumped in the thrash-can.
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According to him, the code is a set of rules guiding fire prevention and control in all public buildings in Nigeria.
“The question still remains thus; how much does Nigerian know about these Fire code; and, how much of this policy is implemented in our public buildings?”, he said. He called on the federal government and regulatory bodies saddled with the responsibility to implement these codes to be up and doing.
He stated that most filing station in the country have no fire detection and fighting equipment. “Public buildings housing more than 50 people are not adequately protected, if the fire code is operational, we would not have cases like this.”
Also, he noted that technical knowledge and awareness of the latest innovations and trends on fire detection and suppression within the industry has not improved overtime, further adding that some consultants are still recommending obsolete and non- existent products to developers.
“Knowledge here is Key to nation building and this year’s fire security seminar is aimed at being a stop-gap.”
The objective of the Fire security seminar 2014 was to familiarise designers, reviewers, inspectors and ELV consultants with the latest EN & UL certifications as it relate to fire detection and talking of networking, the event created the right environment for delegates to interact freely and exchange technical knowledge.
After the introduction session, Leo Jakob, Area Sales Manager for Securiton AG, Switzerland took on the delegates to present the various specialised fire detection system: Aspirating Smoke Detector – SecuriRAS ASD 535, Linear Heat Detector – SecuriSens ADW535 and Linear Heat Detector – SecuriSens LIST & D-LIST.
The special systems brought new dimension to effective fire prevention with HD sensors.
These products are ideal in the oil & gas for securing the floating roof tank, and in Energy sector used to secure the transformers, just to mention a few success stories.
Later in the day, there were also sessions for the addressable fire detection system called SecuriFire. SecuriFire is a highly modular and fully redundant fire detection system with SpiderNet technology. It is the best fire detection system with the highest loop length 3500 meter and highest participating devices of 250 elements within a loop. It has redundancy both on board and on the loop line.
Ben Uzor
