Manual fire fighting tactics at Nuclear Power Plant

The general requirements of fire protection at nuclear power plant (NPP) are fire protection program, fire hazard analysis, and fire prevention features. In addition, specific fire protection requirements such as water supplies, fire detection, fire protection of safe related equipment, and safe shutdown capabilities must be provided. Particularly, manual fire fighting is required as specific requirements with the provisions to secure manual fire suppression, fire brigade and its training, and administrative controls for manual fire fighting. If a fire is alarmed and confirmed to be a real fire, the fire brigade must take manual fire fighting activities as requested at fire protection program. According to the present requirements in itself, there is not any specific manual fire fighting ways or practical strategies. In general, fire zones or compartments at NPPs are built in a confined condition. In theory, the fire condition will change from a combustible-controlled fire to a ventilation-governing fire with the time duration. In case of pool fire with the abundant oxygen and flammable liquid, it can take just a few minutes for the flash-over to occur. For the well-confined fire zone, it will change from a flame fire to a smoldering state before the entrance door is opened by the fire brigade. In this context, the manual fire fighting activities must be based on a quantitative analysis and a fire risk evaluation. At this paper, it was suggested that the fire zones at NPPs should be grouped on the inherent functions and fire characteristics. Based on the fire risk characteristics and the fire zone grouping, the manual fire fighting tactics are suggested as an advanced fire fighting solution