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Permalink Reply by John on February 14, 2009 at 1:10am

Luckily we have none in our response area

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Permalink Reply by Shawn on February 14, 2009 at 1:12am

...... we have to many to count... well that is Alberta for you....

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Permalink Reply by Oldman on February 14, 2009 at 9:55am

What type of facilities are you referring to? While there are definite dangers inside tank farms, around wellheads and pump jacks, compressor stations, etc. they are usually not an extreme problem outside the immediate area. Air monitoring, wind direction and speed would be indicated inside the facility. We do occasional incidents around tank batteries and pads and will wear SCBA around or on the tanks, but its not much of an issue on an MVC on the roadway adjacent to the facility.

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Permalink Reply by Shawn on February 15, 2009 at 7:55pm

Yes, I am referring to wellheads, pump jacks, risers, compressor stations, drilling operations and such. In Parkland County we have many sour gas wells and many more are planned...

The reason this has all come about is due to a recent incident where two oil/gas industry workers lost their lives as result of electrocution… but the question brought to the table during the debrief was how did we confirm/determine that is was a electrocution rather than sour gas, as the incident took place on a soar gas drilling site… I, myself was not involved with this incident so I don’t know how everything was handled on scene but with the Chief saying we need an SOG on such topic, I would assume no air monitoring was setup during the incident….

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Permalink Reply by Mike Schlags (Captain Busy) Retd on February 15, 2009 at 8:56pm

Responding to an Oil Gas Facility Incident

Note: This is not intended to be all inclusive but just some initial key points and some contacts to help you out...

1. Key point here is having the facilities provide you with what there SOP's are. Not being a fire department, businesses typically have identified procedures vs. guidelines that we use for legal reasons. What you are looking for is for the plant to call 911 first, no matter what. The sooner we can get there, the sooner we can work with them toward resolving the incident.
2. Uproach from uphill, upwind, upgrade to predetermined locations, dependent upon the type and location of the incident.
3. Does the business have a control room with remote gas monitoring that can give you heads up before arrival whether there is sour gas (H2S) or other flammable gas related issues to deal with.
4. Can you remotely isolate power to minimize ignition potential?
5. Does the business have their own ERT (emegency response team)? and if so, have you met with them ahead of time to be both familiar with what they have as well as what that do and provide you in regard to resources.
6. Have you preplanned sheltering in place for downwind issues?
7. Do you have any target hazards such as hospitals, nursing homes, schools, shopping centers, etc. that could be impacte should an incident occur and do your preplans address these concerns?
8. Have you made contact with your state oil and gas folks to help develop the SOG's? i.e. boiler plate SOG's that follow established guidelines put together by your state...
9. Have you made contact with the EPA, and requested your local area OCC (on scene coordinator) to meet with you and share information in regard to developing your SOG's?
10. When you do make contact with the EPA OCC, request who will be responding to an incident from the EPA's START Team. These contractors are there to resolve the issue should the business not have appropriate mitigation measures in place. They are also a wonderful resource that folks generally don't think about until the caca hits the fan...
11. With minimal effort, you can find a lot of SOG examples on the web using google. Here's one example, click this link.

Good luck with your project!

TCSS, Mike

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Permalink Reply by Joey "BigShow" De Piano on February 15, 2009 at 9:16pm

I do not have a copy from my first dept. where we protected Stephan chemical.but it pretty much calls for the same degree as any HazMat call..you should set a Hot Zone ..Warm..Cold and stage area and nothing goes in or near till all Dangers and degrees of product contained are identified and how to approach...Thats pretty much a gaspel as I understand it for any potential "Boom factor" including response to Bomb threat calls..Stay Back no hard chargers in something that can take out a city..Post 9/11 had Homeland Security rewrite a ton of bobles on this you might try them for SOG on that especially with terror threats ..I knoew we were told to assume any call of that nature are potential terrorist and when sure its not develope the situation downward on degree of its nature naturally

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