Taken in the event of a crisis in
general a contingency is defined as a
situation that occurs that may endanger
safety life or the environment
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information on the various stages of a
contingency
take for example a situation in which a
hazard or accident has been noticed this
may have either been done by human means
or a detective may have registered a
problem when a person notices the
problem they must observe what is
happening
evaluate the situation
give the proper warnings as described in
the alarm instructions take actions
according to the current situation and
their own abilities
the operations unit takes charge of
handling the contingency and initiate
actions to be taken by the contingency
organization such as making observations
from the bridge by sending someone out
on watch evaluating the situation from
the data that has been collected or
received giving the appropriate warnings
calling a staff meeting and getting crew
members to muster at their stations
local authorities initiate measures
according to the instructions they have
received and will requisition the
necessary resources gather advisors and
guidance
the main office is notified and they
initiate measures such as setting up a
centre for relatives of those involved
in the emergency informing the media
legal assistance
establishing a commission
as stated earlier in this module though
the captain has the overall
responsibility during a firefighting
operation
normally it is either the chief engineer
or chief officer that actually leads the
fire teams and coordinate their actions
usually a fire team will consist of two
to four team members the number of fire
teams on board will depend upon the size
of the ship but usually there are at
least two teams on even the smallest of
tankers in addition to the fire teams
there will also be a first a team and a
technical team the first a team is
responsible for performing basic medical
care on injured persons the technical
team will in the case of a fire activate
fixed installation extinguishing
equipment and they are responsible for
the continued operation of the ship
upon detecting a fire there are three
basic tasks that must be completed alert
rescue and extinguish the order in which
these actions are taken will depend upon
the situation however the primary
objectives of a firefighting operation
our first of all saving lives and
secondly protecting the environment
this differs slightly from the
priorities of firefighting operations on
land due to the fact that fires at sea
can have far more serious consequences
than for example a burning house
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information on these subjects
as long as it is reasonable to do so the
best thing to do is attack a fire
immediately upon its detection with a
full show of force that is why it is
important that the bridge is notified
immediately upon detection either
directly through the shipboard
communications network or by automatic
alarms or other warning systems
during the initial phase of a fire it is
the duty of the person that discovered
the fire to attempt to rescue lives as
long as their actions do not endanger
further loss of life as soon as
firefighting teams get involved their
actions must also be aimed at saving
lives as well as following the commands
made by the person's co-ordinating the
operation the term rescue can have many
meanings the most obvious being getting
people out of the danger zone and to a
safe place less obvious our fire control
measures such as cooling walls and
passageways to limit the spread of fire
closing ventilation ports to limit the
spread of smoke removing flasks of gas
and turning off the electricity closing
off the area
if necessary evacuation of the vessel
during the initial phase of the
firefight
operation if there is any suspicions but
crew members are missing or perhaps
trapped the fire teams activities will
be concentrated on rescue orientated
firefighting in other words the teams
will work through accommodations and
other populated areas in order to save
lives
if this is not necessary the teams will
simply search through the area before
taking an offensive on extinguishing the
fire
this will of course depend upon the
situation in some situations it will
simply be impossible to enter an area
before the fire is under control
however in such situations the lives of
those in the fire zone have already been
lost