Fighting fire

JUST weeks after a BD1.8 million blaze destroyed a leading motor company's warehouse and left two firemen needing hospital treatment for smoke inhalation, plans for another conference on fire prevention and safety in Bahrain have been announced.

FDIC Middle East will bring together firefighters and fire, health and safety professionals of the Gulf region.

Jeremy Richardson, event director, said: "The aim of FDIC Middle East is to offer a centre point for all aspects of the fire industry, from fire prevention and fire safety to fire fighting, ensuring this event remains the premier event for the fire industry in the region.

"The further development of the fire prevention and fire safety aspect aims to aid the co-operation between the fire fighting community and the fire, health and safety professionals tasked with improving fire prevention and safety in the workplace and home."

Fire prevention has become an integral part of FDIC Middle East, as the region continues its rapid economic expansion and fire prevention and safety remains high on the agenda, particularly in the construction sector, where the Middle East supports major high-rise residential structures that rival any found throughout the major cities of the world.

Many times, fire prevention and fire protection refers to 'hardware' issues, such as automatic detection devices, fixed systems both manual and automatic or passive fire protection requirements such as spacing requirements, design requirements or fireproofing.

These products and services will all be present and on show at FDIC Middle East 2009, being held in Bahrain from February 17 to 19 at the Bahrain International Exhibition Centre.

However, fire prevention and fire protection also has a human aspect, which sees highly trained firefighters respond to incidents in industrial, commercial and residential occupancies.

FDIC Middle East has further developed its offering to incorporate additional fire prevention, protection education and training.

Hands-On-Training modules will give fire-fighters real, live training under the guidance of some of the most experienced fire-fighters in the world. In carefully selected venues fire-fighters will learn techniques and practical theory on a range of live emergency situations.

The conference provides classroom based learning that gives fire-fighters, fire prevention and fire safety industry related professionals the most up-to-date knowledge on topics from fire prevention and fire safety in commercial and industrial sectors, to how to fight fires.

FDIC Middle East also offers an opportunity for companies to showcase their products that enable fire-fighters and fire, health and safety professionals to do the jobs.

Leading international organisations will be exhibiting their products and services at FDIC Middle East exhibition Hall 2 in the Bahrain International Exhibition Centre.

Suppliers of fire prevention and fire safety equipment, designed for the general populace, will be showing their products. The overriding aim is to contribute to greater overall awareness of the risks associated with fire which will lead to lives being saved.

The fire that destroyed the car parts warehouse in Sehla was due to an electrical short circuit, official investigations have confirmed.

National Motors Company is planning to replace it with a state-of-the-art vehicle servicing and spare parts facility which will boast the latest fire safety innovations.