FRV Deputy Commissioner appears on Ch9 news after a spate of Lithium Ion fires, pleading with community to make safe decisions when charging and looking after the batteries.
FRV written safety advice states:
‘Charge your device on non-combustible surfaces in a room where a smoke alarm is present. Avoid locations where a fire would block your exit.’
The problem is, at most FRV stations FRV installed lithium-ion chargers are stored in Turnout rooms, where firefighters get dressed to respond to a fire.
And last week one of these chargers and Batteries went into thermal runaway, causing release of dangerous gases and contaminating firefighters turnout gear, luckily due to firefighters quick response they minimised damage.
With an utter lack of leadership in this space, why should the community listen to management when firefighters don’t have faith in them to keep us safe.