Gas Cylinders on Fire Trucks - Is there a directive/standard on Safe Stowage?

Initial Email Enquiry –

As a fire truck bodybuilder we are hearing conflicting ideas regarding how compressed gas cylinders (in our case nitrogen or Co2 expellant cylinders for dry powder extinguishers) must be mounted on fire trucks for the UK............some say horizontal for service access, others say vertical for safety.Perhaps there is an EU or similar directive on this.....please can anyone guide us?

1st Response –

I understand that we must be careful when handling or storing any gas cylinders on fire apparatus. We also must remember that we have numerous gas cylinders on every fire truck that we just handle as if they could not be dangerous, SCBA cylinders. We have had a few incidents where they have ruptured, Detroit FD where one in a trucks compartment exploded and destroyed the trucks compartments. Other events such as one in Florida where it killed a person filling it. Then we have some departments with cascade or compressor systems on trucks and how careful are we those systems.

In the US a fire department with a cascade system or carrying hundreds of SCBA cylinders, it would be required to have a Haz Mat placard if it was in commercial service. We in the emergency service are not exempt, we just ignore this law.

We in the emergency business too many times think that rules and laws are for someone else. We should maybe look over our shoulder and follow some of the rules and laws that we enforce.

2^nd Response –

As you may be aware we took delivery of 2 Airport Type Foam Tenders last year, these are huge 6 wheel drive vehicles, that can produce 100,000 litres of foam in approx 2 minutes, we also have a dry powder system on these , which uses Nitrogen as expellant, these cylinders are mounted vertically on these appliancies. I have contacted Carmichael's who built these for us, they tell me that the chassis arrive with these already fitted, if you need any information regarding this, they will assist wherever they can. They can be contacted on www. carmichael-int.co.uk. If they cannot help there should be able to get information from the chassis builders.

End of email correspondence on Topic to date

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