How Do We Fight Fires Aboard Ferries?

My CackalackyCon talk about Fire Safety Systems and Building Codes and More...

WA State Ferries Employment Opportunities...

I recently posted photos of the fire suppression system on one of the ferry vessels I was riding, and it resulted in a mix of reactions... with some folk incorrectly thinking that I was highlighting some kind of problem or faulty equipment. No, in fact, the ferry system here in Washington State features a unique variety of fire suppression equipment and it's all up-close and personal where any riders on these vessels can see it in person. This is a video discussing how some of their systems work. Enjoy! 👍😁👍

- -- ----- ----------
I'm on the Fediverse. That's a great place to find me...

I'm also on Instagram. I mostly use it for liking my friends' photos...

Bluesky may still be in beta, but I'm over there...

I'm also on Discord, but mostly only because my daughter uses it, lol...

I post dumb questions to Reddit and sometimes answer folks' questions there, too...

This is my GitHub. I post my design files there...

I still have my Twitter account. I don't use it anymore and neither should you...

This is my personal web site. Most things i create wind up online...

This is my company. We're good at stuff...

This is where I train. Come and learn badass skills...
- -- ----- ----------

[MacCalder]

HighFog needs really clean water... At least when i worked cruise ships, the pipes had to be stainless steel to limit the risk of contaminates. I was lucky enough to do a take out, and one of the tests was of highfog, it was really impressive.

We'd regularly train with extinguishers and fire hoses, the high fog creamed it. The fire hoses tended to pull from the ro tanks first, but could pull from sea if needed... that said, general advice to the fire teams was to just use the fire hoses to burst the bulbs and clear the compartment, rather than directly confronting the fire in most cases.

[NewScottishGentry]

hey! I’m a huge fan and also a WSF deckhand! so the Hi-Fog system has its own day tank of clean, filtered water (I think it’s about 1000 gallons? i’m actually going in today onto an Olympic boat and could check if you’re interested!) — i’ve been told that the system is under so much pressure and the spray head nozzles are so fine that particulates from sea water can mess them up. also, the Chelan has Hi-Fog in the passenger cabin for SOLAS, but the main use on the WSF boats are in the engine room. the KDT and Olympic class boats use it in the engine room in lieu of fixed CO2 systems, where the main benefit is that you can turn it on without having to evacuate the space. also you can turn it on or off, where with CO2 you basically get one shot — and if you use it you’re losing propulsion and having to keep the engine room sealed until you get towed to a dock where shoreside FF can come aboard. anyway if you have any questions about anything ferries related, let me know, I’d be happy to help! cheers!

[DeviantOllam]

Dangerous game: take a drink whenever I say the word "vessel" ⛴️

[Rear_Admiral_Haddock]

I spent a few years at sea on cellular container vessels in the early 2000s. At the time, CO2 or halon suppression systems were the most prevalent systems i came across. While they are wonderfully effective in extinguishing a fire they do have the added downside of not being particular friendly to the crew. We had to undergo regular fire drills that involved donning an EEBD (Emergency Escape Breathing Device), essentially a plastic bag you stuck over your head with a 5 minute air supply on it as if the fire system was activated you'd have 15 seconds to either escape whichever space you were in or get to an EEBD in order to survive. Im glad i never had to use one in anger.
As my time at sea was coming to an end the HI-FOG systems were becoming really popular in engine and cargo spaces for not just the effectiveness of them but also the survivability for any persons caught up in a discharge. Amongst former colleagues that I've spoken with since, including a few that have had to deal with shipboard fires, its fairly safe to say that HI-FOG is a hugely popular system.

[TheRealIncryptus]

Funny this comes out today. A very close friend of mine is a captain for ferries in a country in Europe. There is a "new" company that bought a number of ships. This "new" company is run by...lets say shady character, "allegedly" a gangster oligarch. There was a fire in one of these vessels less than 2 weeks ago, 5 days later it was running with passengers. There was zero fire suppression, zero fire extinguishers on board, and part of the ceiling fell in on my friends head nearly killing him. This company is STILL pushing these vessels, there are more than a few, that are literally floating death traps. I have seen detailed photos of the interior and they look like they are unfinished ships. One of these was FINALLY removed from service when an inspector that they hadn't paid off well-enough said no because they cut all of the structural supports from one of the decks to allow for more room for seating. They didn't brace anything, they just cut out the columns. The floor sagging above was the only reason it is out of service today. This entire industry is crazy and corrupt.

[tyranneous]

I don't know about the fire suppression or anything like that, but coincidental timing as this weekend I was out on the UK's largest operating steam ship the SS Shieldhall. It's diesel-fired furnaces/boilers, but yup - there's two whackin' great steam engines driving the props! Talking to the volunteer engineers, they have immense difficulties with the agency in charge of marine safety here in the UK because they don't have any categories for passenger carrying steam ships, so everything is an exception.

Which is probably why you can still just walk around inside the engine room - no guard rails, no nothing - as hundreds of pounds of hot, oily metal are within mere inches of crushing your limbs. It's amazing.

[mooboy]

One of the big reasons for the lower flow suppression systems is to reduce the risk of cascade failure leading to potential capsize and sinking. If the deck drains on the car deck fail (or clog), then the water from the sprinklers becomes a big capsize risk due to the free surface effect.

[YehudaKatz]

In our data center, the pre-action is controlled by multiple smoke detectors. There are 24 in the ceiling and 24 under the raised floor. If one detects smoke, it turns off the room HVAC and starts an initial alarm - orange strobe and supervisory monitoring signal. If a second one detects smoke, it kills power to the room PDUs, allows the sprinkler pipes to flood (although they will only actually run if one of the alcohol tubes pops) and sets off the building alarm (which is separate from the data center alarm) and a fire monitoring signal. If I remember correctly, if a sprinkler head breaks without a smoke alarm, it will also set off a supervisory signal due to the pressure drop.

[hive_indicator]

The point about walkable cities and cruise ships was really good!

[jasonphilbrook]

I do some contract work for ferries in Maine. They are desperately hiring. If you like people and boats/ocean it could be a good union government job with benefits and retirement, etc... I was on the ferry during a deluge system test. It puts out a LOT of water. A shower is an understatement. The car deck turned into a river at least an inch or two deep from water coming down from overhead faster than it could flow away. There is a real beefy pump in the engineroom. I'm not sure where the water came from but there is a lot of room under the decks of the ferries where fuel, water, and other heavy items can be stored.

[mariagacel]

Love the shake hands with danger shirt!

[minyiiiii]

other unrelated note on usage of HI FOG on ships- because they use so much less water, it's probably also safer to use them for longer periods of time, since in scenarios of prolonged firefighting efforts aboard ships, the weight of the water upsetting the balance of the ship and threatening to capsize is often a significant factor. not a professional, but probably also a major factor for the use of HI FOG

[MrPMRing]

Took me by surprise when you showed the New Orleans, LA pics.

[gabrielorange]

Back when I was a sea scout, we were donated a a 30 foot firefighting vessel from the local fire department. it had an entire 150hp engine devoted to pumping water from the sea and out of a 2inch nozzle mounted to the top of the ship.

[Obliteratu]

My kind of nerd-out tangential ramble. Keep it up, dude 👍🏽

[MAlanThomasII]

I am reminded of the system on Iowa-class battleships (and maybe modern warships) where there's a specialized deluge system for the ammunition stores that's designed to quickly flood the space. Not dump water on it, completely fill it with water. Last person out of the watertight hatch into the space has a trigger right there, or it can be remotely triggered from the local or main damage control. (As best I remember it, anyway; the Battleship New Jersey's YouTube channel talked about it in one of their videos.)

[noahwilliams]

Omg Deviant urbanism arc!! I’m so here for it!!!!

[wewillrockyou]

I guess this is now the Ollam fire fighting era

[ChristofferETJ]

Water mist systems are so effective, that they are replacing CO2 systems in modern ships.

Previously, you would have a one-shot CO2 fire suppression system in critical areas, e.g. machinery spaces. And if you fired it off, you couldn't enter the space in the next 24 hours or so. Not great if you only have one engine room. With water mist, you put out the fire, start up the undamaged machines, and begin repairs on whatever is damaged. Of course, modern passenger ships also have multiple engine rooms.

Look up SRTP for the top level of ship safety design.

[ba]

When I was living in SF I still went on cruises. Every day you're somewhere different and you get to sleep in the same room every night. I'd love to do a world cruse someday. Maybe I'm just a outlier, I like taking Amtrak too.