HSE Review of Stove Accident

[Scots_Charles_River]

Interesting reading - 5ltr container used to refill a trangia :bluThinki, 25 in a DofE group- far to big

http://www.hse.gov.uk/press/2013/rnn-ldn-02113.htm?eban=govdel-press-release&cr=25-Jan-2013

 

[Niels]

I feel sorry for that girl that's scarred for life

 

[Shewie]

Sad news for the girl

I doubt a different container would've made much difference, it sounds like somebody poured meths onto a lit stove and that can only end in one way.

 

[Scots_Charles_River]

Our school has only allowed gas and out of tent cooking, idea is you always see or here gas flames. Trying to prevent any issues.

 

[greensurfingbear]

Sad news for the girl

I doubt a different container would've made much difference, it sounds like somebody poured meths onto a lit stove and that can only end in one way.

Having read the hse I'm inclined to agree but the sheer speed of pouring from a 5ltr container would mean more splash back compared to using a fuel bottle. It's a real shame to hear about people getting hurt especially young people who we want to encourage into the outdoors.


Orric

 

[copper_head]

Poor girl

 

[HillBill]

It was a stupid thing for anyone to do. I may be wrong but from the way it reads, she KNEW the fire was still lit, but "going out" not gone out. I do feel bad for the lass, and a meths burner can look like its out when its not so, i don't mean to sound harsh.

It also sounds like the person in charge didn't act correctly once her clothing was on fire. He rolled her around on the floor and poured water on her. Fair dooz, drop and roll is what you do if you catch fire on your own, but in that situation he should have laid on top of her to smother the flames. Bugger the implied implications to it, you need to smother the fire, simples. Rolling someone over will only smother the fire on the side against the ground, you need complete oxygen deprivation else it will just blaze up again.

Its a bad situation that could have been avoided.

Yes, i do feel for the girl though, she is young and has her whole life ahead of her. Things like this need to be avoided. People need to be taught properly. Its most and i do mean most, important to teach what SHOULDN'T be done before what should be done.

 

[petrochemicals]

in my opinion something does not sound right there, if anything it sounds like a case of playing around with fire in flammable clothing, rather than the meths. It brings back memories of the 80's an people in shell suits. The schools should not let anyone play about with fire in clothes made from oil, flashover or not.

I do not condone the meths usage by the children, but a meths flash over does not sound exactly like the reason, perhaps if the one girl poured alot of meths directly onto her maybe, but even then, it would have to have been something to get her face.

And now my credentials to vouch for my authority :
I have had my hands on fire , my cotton jeans on fire , and meths evapourate quickly whilst burning on a cotton surface and feel cool to begin with as they burn. My hair even survived.
If you don't have faith in me after that you never will.

It's the clothes and someone really should tell D of E to make sure that the participants, as well as the organisers are aware of which clothes are flammable and how having thin polyester head scarfs isn't good around any naked flame!

 

[Toddy]

Lots of good points.

Teaching is crucial because all too often people don't think it though first; we can all do stupid things, mostly we get away with them and a lesson well learned. This poor girl though and the folks with her too, and the staff in charge of them. Sore all round there

Clothing........oh there's a can of worms. Bushcrafters preferrance for wool is for a good reason, but it's not cheap, it's not really 'fashionable' and that means it's not freely or easily available.
With care other fabrics are fine, but it's 'with care'.
Crimpelene trousers of my youth melted and stuck to the skin, shell suits can go up like a torch, cotton is clearly labelled on nightclothes as not safe near fire; (the older ones among us will remember tv public service 'adverts' with a wee girl reaching up to the mantleshelf and her nightgown going up in flare of fire and screams) the list is endless.
If the kids only used totally firesafe clothing, they'd never find it or buy it and we'd not get them out the door.
I think that's why ScotCharlesRiver's practical alternative works. It's as safe as can be made for a diverse group to at least get out and start learning safely.

Polyester head and face scarves are commonplace now; again the insistance could be that they only wore wool, but the same problems arise as with the rest of the clothing.

It's kind of harsh to say this, but this horrendous incident is a good example of what not to do; if it's used as such and stops anyone else suffering, maybe some good can come out of it.

The girl's young, I know she has had to have skin grafts, but we'll hope she heals well.

5ltr container of meths.....there's no way to pour from that cleanly

M

 

[Ogri the trog]

Looks like I've missed much of the discussion of this.

I teach D of E expedition skills to two youth organizations - I teach them to verify that stoves are extinguished by three means before adding any more fuel. One group didn't have their own Meths safety bottle, so I lent them mine for the duration of the expedition - much better for me to have been out-of-pocket than held up responsible for an accident such as this.

There are a number of methods for reducing the impact of events like this - and it's certainly not rocket science;

1, Look for a heat haze - we know that meths can burn with an invisible flame so you wont always see it - look for the heat haze.
2, Lay a blade of grass over the top of the stove - if it withers, it is still alight.
3, Using the back of the hand, wave your hand well above the stove, feeling for rising heat - getting lower only if you are confident to do so - I recommend the back of the hand because if you do burn the back of your hand the implications are that you can still grip things with your fingers!
4, Stoves are NEVER refilled in a "cooking" area - this avoids the ignition of any fumes, but also means the stove has to be picked up and moved - if its hot, they won't pick it up!
5, Stoves are NEVER refuelled on the ground - if a stove is at ground level, there is a tendency to stand over it when adding more fuel - if the stove is on a table, the top of a wall or even the top of a fence post, it allows an escape route by ducking away from any resulting fireball.
Most of the reasons I give are extreme precautions but stories like this take so little thought to completely avoid.

Our county council has specified that meths is the only acceptable fuel for D of E expeditions, so we only have to deal with this type of stove - I wonder if this report will cause them to change their mind!

ATB

Ogri the trog

 

[Scots_Charles_River]

You may surprised how few accidents happen with Bounsen (seplling?) Burners at schools, yes the big scarves are common and most uniforms are made of 100% plastic.

When using the forge we have a thick leather apron and full face visor and sleeves rolled up. Two schools of thought about gloves though 1- wear leather gloves to avoid touching hot materials 2- don't wear gloves so you can feel heat sources and objects and can manipulate controls eg valve or the gas torch properly.

I had a group (timetabled class) doing firelighting in the woods with a kellykettle last week and explained what can happen eg lifting off the kelly kettle with the handle vetical = burn hand, how to pour the kelly kettle eg put the cup on the ground don't hold it - avoids burning a cup holders hands.

 

[bigroomboy]

I have done the exact same thing once and I definitely won't do it again. Having said that it was not as bad as this example. I poured into a stove I thought had gone out but there was some residual flame at the very bottom. A medium size fireball resulted and the bottle on fire. But the fire died down with in a second and slapping my hand over the bottle put that out. There was no injury other than shock but I always triple check the burner is out now, try to only use the trangia bottle or when abroad buy the small bottles. This story sounds like a panicked reaction as the person burned was not the person filling which makes me think the fuel was thrown on her from the shock of the fire ball.

 

[Andy BB]

First of all, sympathy for those injured.

However, once again, is this (ie H&S) not just being over-stated? We've got people on here questioning whether children (the girl was 15...) should be allowed access to Meths, and others saying that gas cylinders are safer. Presumably the use of pressurised liquid fuel stoves should be banned to all other than those with a Masters degree in nuclear physics?

Personally, I think that (unpressurised) Meths (ie predominantly ethanol) is about the safest fuel/cooking system going. It has half the energy of other liquid fuels (less likely to flare badly or cause instant damage on temporary contact with skin even if flaming), water can be used to put it out (don't try that with cooking oil/petrol/parafin fires...), and is relatively non-toxic (not the case with methanol however).

THe girl did something stupid - pour flammable material onto an open flame from a 5 litre container. Even if she hadnt been specifically briefed about not doing something so blatantly stupid, she should have recognised the danger herself - she was 15, not 3, or mentally challenged as far as I can tell from the article. Yet because of this incident and resulting publicity, the likelihood of other schools or organisations running Duke of Edinburgh Award camps - or any other sort of outing - will be significantly reduced for all the typical H&S/insurance/liability reasons.

Wouldn't it be nice if - just once - someone actually said "It was my fault - I did something stupid"? But when there's serious money to be made from blaming someone else - and there'll always be lawyers and H&S "experts" to point the finger - I doubt if it'll ever catch on.

Many decades ago, part of my professional training included the law of Torts (Civil Law), where there was an assumption of reasonableness that should be applied to any case. And it was explained as what would "a man on the Clapham Omnibus" (or what the Americans would probably call your average Joe) consider reasonable. It would appear nowadays that the "man on the clapham omnibus" is incredibly stupid...........

 

[Paul Webster]

Sad news for the girl

I doubt a different container would've made much difference, it sounds like somebody poured meths onto a lit stove and that can only end in one way.

It might have, I have a couple of trangia fuel bottles with a safety cut off. i.e. you take your finger off the button and the flow stops. The flashover wouldn't have been anything like 5ltrs going woof

 

[Laurentius]

A very foolish thing to do, but I think it is a bit much to hold the borough responsible or to put the blame on containers, it is fair and square the individual who was responsible and whoever should have been supervising and instructing her.

 

[rik_uk3]

The Trangia bottles should have been used. That said, whilst I'm very sorry for the young girl I have to think...she did a really stupid thing and some of the blame should rest on her shoulders.

 

[petrochemicals]

rick, there where 2 girls !

 

[petrochemicals]

you horrid horrid man rick, booooo!

 

[petrochemicals]

there may be few bunsen burner accidents in, but believe it or not there are alot of large quantities of methanol in glass containers jetting and flashovering , leading to droppage and smashing and soaking onto students synthetic uniforms that then melt. At least with thick cotton and wool you have chance to remove your clothes. I have seen DofE groups, all tracksuits and hairspray. Although its a nice idea giving kids a taste of the outdoors no thought seems to have gone on the practicalities or the nessesities of the situation. If they cannot do it safeley in the classroom, they have it worse outside. It is possibly a credit to the outdoor manufacturers that there are less accidents than there are !

Gas would be ok if the kids agreed not to get high on it. 1 vote for hexameine

 

[bearpark]

I agree with some of the above, but not all. I think it is a little naive to put the blame on a 15 year old girl who probably had little experience handling and using volatile, flammable liquids - it is down to training and supervision for me.

Firstly, the staff running the DofE expedition should have been trained effectively in the safe use (and storage) of meths and meths burners. They should have had access to the COSHH sheet for meths and adhered to the advice when teaching others to use it.

Secondly, the supervision. As the staff were clearly present at the scene they should have casting a beady eye over the refilling of stoves, and put the necessary equipment in place to avoid untrained, inexperienced children pouring litres of the purple stuff out of a drum onto hot brass. Even if the stove was no longer alight (which it may have been) the latent heat can still cause a fireball - as I'm sure many of you have experienced!

Lastly, I totally advocate the use of meths with DofE groups as petrochemicals said. But only with the correct training and supervision in place, where necessary. Accidents like this are totally avoidable.