Fire Crews from Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service continue to tackle the large fire at a recycling facility at Seaforth Docks which they were originally called out to at around 11.20pm on 21 October.

6 fire appliances and two aerial units (combined platform ladders) were deployed to a scrap metal recycling facility at Seaforth docks, where firefighters continued to fight the fire throughout the night in arduous conditions. Firefighters have now surrounded the fire and will continue firefighting until the fire is fully extinguished.

Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service has been working closely with partners in Sefton Council, Public Health England, the Environment Agency and Port Police to ensure risks to both the environment and business continuity at the docks are mitigated.

The weather forecast suggests that the plume direction should remain upwards for most of the day and is unlikely to affect people at this time. As temperatures drop overnight,residents of North Wirral may notice a smell of smoke and should keep windows and doors closed.

If residents are concerned about smoke they should stay indoors, keep their doors and windows closed, and tune in to local radio stations for advice and information.
People with asthma and other respiratory conditions may be particularly susceptible to the smoke and should carry and use their medication (such as inhalers) as usual and try to remain out of the smoke.

If you have any concerns about the smoke’s impact on your health please contact the NHS 111 service (which is free from both landlines and mobiles and open 24/7) or your GP surgery for advice, following any instructions for out of hours services.

There are not currently any road closures in effect around the Seaforth docks area and smoke from the fire is not currently known to be affecting any residential areas.

The incident is significant and ongoing and is likely to continue for a considerable length of time. Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service and the other agencies involved will continue to monitor the situation and issue advice to the public, businesses and organisations affected as necessary.

Fires ongoing for more than 3+ days aye.. I guess this is what happens when you cut services to the bone, leaving 6 appliances to fight a fire.. If anybody has ever noticed, often In the States when there's a large fire, a large one.. Not a bit of a scrap fire like this. There are fire appliances everywhere.. like 20 or 30 or more, and even airport foam throwers if necessary. That's how you fight fires!!
6 appliances as in this case can obviously only just 'control' this fire and are not able to extinguish it. Or are Sefton of the opinion now that... We don't reeeally need any appliances these days.. leave the fire long enough and it'll burn itself out!

What is it with 'recycling facilities' burning down these days? Sure there's plenty to burn, but so is there in many other industries, which seem to experience fires of this scale as rarely as we'd expect.

Can anyone who's worked in one of these places explain why they're seemingly more susceptible to massive, accidentally caused fires than anywhere else?

Originally Posted by Superbead

What is it with 'recycling facilities' burning down these days? Sure there's plenty to burn, but so is there in many other industries, which seem to experience fires of this scale as rarely as we'd expect.

Can anyone who's worked in one of these places explain why they're seemingly more susceptible to massive, accidentally caused fires than anywhere else?

Unless deliberate It's rather easy to see were fires come from in these places. Much of the stuff associated in places like this are often coated in oil or grease etc or have combustible material attached to it before processing, mix that with blokes using grinders, cutting torches & exothermic lances etc, then mix that again with old poorly serviced hydraulic machinery grappling and dropping heavy materials = FIRE :)

Originally Posted by Orb

Unless deliberate It's rather easy to see were fires come from in these places. Much of the stuff associated in places like this are often coated in oil or grease etc or have combustible material attached to it before processing, mix that with blokes using grinders, cutting torches & exothermic lances etc, then mix that again with old poorly serviced hydraulic machinery grappling and dropping heavy materials = FIRE :)

If it's unsafe working practice to blame, the govt ought to be pulling their fingers out by now. Considering how often these happen, it strikes me as odd that there's so little interest in the media as to why.

Plenty of industries reasonably uneventfully deal with fire risks just as significant or far more so than scrap - off the top of my head, paper and textile mills, oil and chemical refinery/shipping/storage, hospitals, any industry processing powdered materials, construction, explosives manufacture, and food processing. It's worth pointing out that for most of these, half their stock isn't soaked with rain half the time, and also that they wouldn't otherwise have to pay to get rid of most of the stuff that gets burnt.

There's an interesting topic at PistonHeads - http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/t...&t=1348364&i=0 - which helpfully catalogues the alarming frequency of these fires in the UK alone over the past few years.

Originally Posted by Superbead

What is it with 'recycling facilities' burning down these days? Sure there's plenty to burn, but so is there in many other industries, which seem to experience fires of this scale as rarely as we'd expect.

Can anyone who's worked in one of these places explain why they're seemingly more susceptible to massive, accidentally caused fires than anywhere else?

When there's no market for the stuff the options are;- Store it until there is, Send it to Landfill - expensive, export it to a third world country to dispose of or have a 'accidental fire'.

Originally Posted by Orb

6 appliances as in this case can obviously only just 'control' this fire and are not able to extinguish it. Or are Sefton of the opinion now that... We don't reeeally need any appliances these days.. leave the fire long enough and it'll burn itself out!

Sefton? The council don't run the fire service.