Overview
By their very nature, emergencies tend to occur when you least expect them. That's why it is essential for every workplace to have fully operational emergency response procedures in place and ready to implement at a moment's notice.
Emergencies are situations that are dangerous or potentially dangerous to life, property or the environment. In the timber industry, emergencies are most likely to arise from a fire or machinery accident. However, depending on where you work, they can also result from a chemical spillage or explosion.
In this section, we'll look at the elements of an emergency plan and the roles of the people whose job it is to respond to the emergency and supervise the safe evacuation of personnel.
Note that this section focuses on the process of monitoring and reviewing the organisation's emergency response procedures, rather than describing specific procedures to be followed in the event of an emergency. Your organisation should already have documented procedures in place for dealing with particular types of emergencies.
For more details on typical first-response procedures for some common types of emergencies, have a look at the following units from the other Toolboxes in the 'Timber' series:
- Safety and environment (aligned to: FPICOR3201A: Implement safety, health and environmental policies and procedures) from the Series 12 'Timber Toolbox'.
- Preventing fires(aligned to: FPICOR2204A: Follow fire prevention procedures) from the Series 13 'Timber Plus Toolbox'.
Completing this section
The assignment set for this section will help you to review your emergency response procedures to determine whether they meet the needs of your organisation and are being implemented effectively.
Have a look at the assignment now to see what you'll need to do to complete it.
Also in the menu bar are links to the following two lessons, which provide background information on topics relevant to the assignment:
- Designing an emergency plan.
- Roles of personnel.
There is also a case study, showing how Paul, a chief warden, monitors the emergency response procedures at his worksite.