Toxic fumes and danger from flammable liquids in large plastics processing plant in Croatia

On October 4th at 00:41, the Professional Fire Brigade of the City of Osijek received an alarm of a fire at the location of the plastic processing and storage company "Drava Internacional" in Osijek. Three firefighters were injured in the operations.

It was a fire involving a large amount of plastic in an open area near buildings, and the fire spread to the roof and inside of one building of the company's facility.

As a result of the burning of a huge amount of plastic, a large amount of smoke and toxic gases were created, and there was also a danger from flammable liquids, which made the work of the firefighters much more difficult.

At 04:52 a.m., the fire began to spread through the whole building, and 1,500 liters of sodium hydroxide and 1,000 liters of hydrochloride (HCL) were extracted from the building.

From 04:16 a robot of the Directorate of Civil Protection joined in extinguishing the fire.

On the first day of the fire, a total of 74 firefighters and 33 fire fighting vehicles from the Osijek-Baranja County were engaged. They were the professional fire brigades from the City of Osijek, Beli Manastir and 17 volunteer fire brigades from the cities of Osijek, Tenja, Sarvaš, Čepin, Osijek Donji Grad, Osijek Gornji Grad, Retfala Osijek, Ivanovac, Ernestinovo, Dalj, Antunovac, Valpovo, Petrijevci, Drenje, Jagodnjak, Belišće, Satnica Đakovačka, Hrastin and also the firefighters of the Osijek Airport.

Over 300 firefighters, more than 130 firefighting vehicles and 33 fire brigades involved

Due to the situation on the ground, the chief fire commander of Croatia ordered the implementation of an extraordinary deployment of the fire brigade from the Vukovar-Srijem County (professional fire brigade Vinkovci, professional fire brigade Županja and professional fire brigade Vukovar) with five firefighters and two fire trucks.

According to the data so far, a total of 316 firefighters with 131 firefighting vehicles from 29 volunteer fire brigades and 4 professional fire brigades were engaged in the incident.

This was an extremely difficult intervention indicated by the fact that three firefighters were also injured while extinguishing the fire. One of the firefighters was injured seriously.

An investigation into the cause of the fire is ongoing, and the Professional fire brigade of the City of Osijek is on duty on the ground.

Text & Photos provided by: 

Anita Čolak, dipl. ing.

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