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Email from Wilford Community Group to Nottinghamshire Fire Service - 17th February 2008 In the Evening Post
article about the ammonia sill at Pork Farms last week, one of your officers
(Steve Jenkins) was quoted as saying "If it had been windy we would have had to
evacuate downwind."
Reply from Station Officer Steve Jenkins to Wilford Community Group - 20th February 2008 I was the hazardous materials specialist at the Pork Farms Incident.
Briefly when we have a chemical leak a standard procedure is to get a specialist weather forecast and plume prediction from the Met Office. This takes about 20 to 30 minutes for them to fax information back to us. This enables us to assess what areas down wind might be at risk from the leak. We then combine this information with details of the nature of the chemical and the quantity leaked. Our standard position is to advise those at risk to stay indoors with doors and windows closed. If it is necessary for those people closest to the incident to be evacuated we have a well practiced multi-agency plan to set up evacuation centres located at leaisure centres well away from the risk. The plan does include providing bus transportation to the evacuation centres.
For the incident at Pork Farms there was no external risk from the leak due to the location in the factory and the prevailing weather conditions on the night. Consequently those living at Wilford were not at risk so no warnings or preparations for evacuation were necessary.
I hope this clarifies the situation to your satisfaction.
Email to Station Officer Steve Jenkins from Wilford Community Group - 20th February 2008 If such an incident were to occur again, and the wind was from the north or north west, is Wilford far enough away from Pork Farms that any ammonia in the air would have dissipated into the atmosphere, or is there a strength of wind that would have taken the gas into Wilford and required people to either close their windows or be evacuated?
Reply from Station Officer Steve Jenkins to Wilford Community Group - 20th February 2008 Realistically I feel that it is very unlikely that Pork Farms presents any real risk to Wilford. I cannot give a 100% assurance because the nature of an ammonia cloud is influenced not only by wind speed and direction but also air temperature, ground temperature, humidity and whether the leak is occuring in daylight or at night (effect of suns rays on the gas cloud in conjunction with moisture and thermal currents coming off the surface of the river). That is why we rely on specialists at the met office using a powerful computer modelling programme to give us a prediction. |
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