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Emergency Exercise Notification – Wednesday 12th May 2010

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A multi agency exercise to test arrangements for the response to a major emergency at one or more of the top tier COMAH (Control of Major Accident Hazards) sites in the Waterside area of Hampshire (Fawley/ Holbury/ Hardley) is to be held on Wednesday 12 May 2010.

 

The companies involved are, Esso, ExxonMobil Chemicals, Nalco, Polimeri Europa, Cognis UK and Tradebe Fawley.

 

Hampshire County Council is required to produce and test the Fawley Off-site Plan (FOSPLAN) for worst case scenarios and this exercise is part of the normal statutory testing requirements.

 

The safety of top tier COMAH sites is given the highest priority with stringent measures in place to ensure that the likelihood of a major emergency occurring is extremely remote.

 

These measures are primarily designed to prevent any hazardous incidents occurring in the first place but the COMAH Regulations also require that plans are in place to deal with the occurrence of a major emergency, no matter how unlikely.

 

Residents and businesses in the immediate area have previously been provided with written information on what they should do in the event of being notified of an accident.

 

The exercise will not involve the sounding of any alarms or impact on the public, but if the warning alarms should be activated they should follow the instructions on their information packs as normal.

 

The exercise will be held at Fawley Power Station and it is stressed that Fawley Power Station is not included in the list of hazardous sites.

 

Its owners RWE npower have kindly allowed the use of their facilities to support the exercise.

 

A broad range of agencies are taking part to help them understand the role they would play in order to provide an effective and efficient co-ordinated response to such an incident.

 

These include police, fire, ambulance, local authorities, Environment Agency, Hampshire Primary Care Trust, Health Protection Agency, Maritime and Coastguard Agency along with the 6 site operators listed above.

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