Fire blanket warning sticker - 'no guarentee that a fire blanket is safe'

[Fire Monkey]

Hello,

I was sent a photo of a sticker on a fire blanket recently that read :

'Following market surveillance The Netherlands Food and Consumer Products Authority has found (October 2014) that fire blankets giving reference to EN 1869:1997 give no guarantee  that a fire blanket is safe because oil or grease fires will not always be extinguished. NAME OF COMPANY therefore advise that fire blankets are not a reliable means to protect against this particular risk.'

May I ask for your views on this statement? I have no information as to if this is only concerning deep fat fryers or just shallow frying. Looking at their website the NFCPA is more of a food standards agency and not a fire specialist manufacturer, tester or other.

Now I understand that fire blankets are designed to stop the air flow to the fire to starve it if oxygen (the old fire triangle again  ) and that they should stay in place for at least 30 minutes after use and that they should be used only if safe to do so and the source of heat should be turned off and so on and so on.

Is not the current standard BS EN 1879 and not 1869 and what is the difference? If a company is fitting new blankets should they all comply to the former and not the latter?

Should this fire equipment provider be placing such a statement on its products and can/should we are them to cease this? As this could lead staff to be concerned about then and not use them when required possibly leading to a fire getting out of control.

Thoughts and comments please ladies and gentlespoons.

Monkey.

[Tom Sutton]

The current standard is BS EN 1869:1997 the superseded standard is BS 6575:1985. The old standard is far more comprehensive and has two categories light/heavy. The new has only one type domestic light for use on domestic chip pans or people clothing. I would think it would depend on what they used it on which would decide how effective it was.

[AnthonyB]

When I first came across these over a year ago I followed it up with the two main UK fire blanket manufacturers.

Basically the Dutch tests were allegedly flawed and so as well as the China fakes some batches of perfectly compliant blankets failed as well.

As a result all blankets sold in Holland must bear this warning and Class F risks have to have an extinguisher (sales of 2 litre wet chemical and ABF agent extinguishers increasing as a result!)

In response to concerns from the UK manufacturers BSI carried out an audit of all kitemarked product using blankets bought independently rather than directly from the manufacturer to randomise the sample batches and submitted them to the full BS EN 1869 fire test.

All passed admirably.

As such a BS EN 1869 kitemarked fire blanket can be safely and effectively used within the design constraints of BS EN 1869 which in effect means risks involving shallow pans of no more than 300mm diameter and/or 3 litres content.

Larger risks require an F rated extinguisher or fixed system as a blanket could fail as they were never intended for bigger fryers under BSEN 1869.

The extinguisher service company putting these silly little stickers on blankets are owned by a manufacturer who has a large Dutch subsidiary. Incidentally they install blankets where there is no risk for them (minimum criteria seems to a be room with fitted cabinets, a sink and a kettle) as well as in areas where based on their own labelling they shouldn't be fitting them in the first place!

If the risk warrants keeping the blanket rather than withdrawing it and it's a kitemarked blanket I just peel the stickers off, otherwise the blanket goes (there are still fakes being imported, eBay is awash with them)

[Fire Monkey]

Great thanks for the history and insight to this.