In-Reply-To: <4B4755B2.9B43.00BA.1**At_Symbol_Here**smith.edu>
First, educate your users
that the valves on those are stay open. If your victims really
need to flush for 15 minutes, that's fine - they should do so, but if
they are done after 1 minute, the valve can be closed manually by
pushing back up on the rod. Yes, you can close them yourself if
the situation is under control, you don't need to wait for an emergency
responder. They're just a simple ball valve:
http://www.safetyemporium.
com/?04155-A The pull rod attaches to the hole on the
actuating arm, so pulling opens the valve and pushing shuts
it.
I never really thought about that in my
grad student days. If I had, I probably could have stopped a
shower-induced flood of the several third-floor labs on the east side of
our chemistry building. Then again, we would never have known that
the building lists six inches in that direction
;-)
You mentioned floor leaks, so I will just
make a few comments on that. The big difficulty with no floor
drains is that the water runs down to lower floors in very unpredictable
ways. I've visited two laboratory buildings that had fires on an
upper floor, and the water drained all the way down through the various
floors all the way to the basements where, of course, the NMR machine$
were located, trashing those. The one piece of advice from this is
that if you have water-sensitive equipment that could be ruined by a
roof leak, fire runoff, or shower discharge from the floor above,
construct an interior roof over the equipment. That could be as
simple as a plastic tarp or Plexiglas tent. Also, whenever
possible, make sure equipment such as pumps etc. are raised above floor
level, even if only a few inches. In the flood I mentioned in the
last paragraph, the water was up to 4 inches
deep.
While I always tell my students that a
shower will put out a million billion gallons per nanosecond, the actual
number is a minimum of 20 gallons per minute. So a shower running
for 10 minutes will easily put out a good 200-300 gallons. If you
have room to store universal absorbent booms, those can hold up to 70
gallons per bale depending on the size/type/manufacturer. And, of
course, you can contain liquid within those while you're hunting for a
giant wet vac. Which, by the way, is another good piece of
equipment to have available in the building. The only issue will
be if there is hazardous waste involved, but that's not the
responsibility of the first-on-scene person
anyway.
Finally, always stress that whatever
damage the shower may do, your health and safety comes first. Make
sure every worker understands that if they think there is a need to use
the shower they should use it - they won't be second guessed or billed
for water damage. People have *died* from underestimating the need
to use showers and/or modesty/damage concerns. See
http://safe2us
e.com/health/2-4d-Dichlorophenol.htm
Best
wishes,
Rob
Toreki
On Jan 8, 2010, at 3:56 PM,
Margaret Rakas wrote:
Hi,
You know the story...new science building,
lots of code-meeting safety showers, and of course there are no floor
drains....
I can buy spill berms...but does anyone have any
other/better responses to what to do when the shower is actually used
(not just testing, we've got a device for that). My understanding
is a huge amount of water gushes out, for 15-20 minutes, and I'm
assuming the potential for leaks in the floor below is another issue
that needs to be dealt with. Luckily, in my time here we've only
had one occasion when the shower was needed, and that was in our 'old'
building, but--I'd rather plan ahead. What DO you do with the
water while you're waiting for the hazmat response/cleanup team to
arrive?
So if anyone has a recommendation or a "this is what
happened to us" story that I could learn from...
Many
thanks,
Margaret
Margaret A. Rakas, Ph.D.
Manager,
Inventory & Regulatory Affairs
Clark Science Center
Smith
College
Northampton, MA. 01063
p: 413-585-3877
f:
413-585-3786
