Cascade & Air Compressor SOP

[thumbmedic]

Our department is getting a mobile cascade and an air compressor at the station from our 2004 grant.
We are in need of SOP’s for both of these. If anyone can help with sample Sop’s it would be much appreciated.

anyone can e-mail me at kafdfiremedic@yahoo.com


Chris Firefighter/Paramedic
Kinde Area Fire Dept.

[firemedicgm]

Just make sure that people know how to use it before they're allowed to do it unsupervised. After returning from a fire once, I checked our compressor to see if all cylinders had been filled and returned to service. When I opened the door, I found two 3000 psi cylinders with the guages sprung because they'd been filled to 4500 psi. After I changed my pants, we bled the pressure out of the cylinders and destroyed them according to the manufacturer's recommendation. It was an expensive (and dangerous) mistake.

[npfd801]

I'm not up on this like I should be, but with the overfilled cylinders - couldn't they have been sent out to be tested before they were destroyed? I know hydrotesting to 5/3 of rated pressure is different than overfilling, but 4500psi still isn't the 5000psi the cylinders are subjected to while being tested.

Again - I could see destroying them after failing their hydro, but maybe I'm missing something.

[Bones42]

Might just be me, but if your compressor allows you to fill your cascade bottles to more pressure than what they are designed to hold, there is a problem with that compressor setup. Try getting some better relief valves put in that won't allow that. It'd be cheaper on the long run.