..Notwithstanding… They Keep On Happening

Notwithstanding the enormous ongoing efforts and the significant progress so far attained in the last few years to increase our knowledge about the root causes of fires and explosions in process plants and even in spite of the remarkable technological progress accomplished in the field of materials and the development of safe design methodologies, such disastrous occurrences keep on happening.    

 This paper reviews the improvement made in the field of fire and explosion prevention and mitigation through an analysis of he globally applied international standards and safe design practices and also specific technologies that are being used by some companies. On  the other hand,  the evaluation of the characteristics, consequences and probable causes of an important number of accidents, some of which are historical but many occurred in the last few years, gives evidence that there is still a lot to be done to face this challenge and to reduce even more the probability of occurrence of major accidents.  The learning experiences gathered from such events in many occasions brought about the introduction of changes in the existing safe design practices and standards.    

As evidenced by statistic studies, the impact in loss of lives, profit and  reputation for the industrial facilities keeps on being very important. To close the gap between the current state of affairs and a future scenario where safety and preventive conditions shall lessen the number and seriousness of disastrous events and consequences a more comprehensive vision of the issue is to be developed.

 The adoption of intrinsically safe designs, good practices of engineering and adherence to globally adopted standards and practices is the key factor but this is not sufficient. Making changes in the operating, maintenance and management procedures and changes in the operating, maintenance and management procedures are also demanded.

This complex scenario requires the participation of duly qualified, knowledgeable, experienced human resources committed to process safety systems and procedures. To promote the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge and raise awareness about the importance of process safety from the early stages of the technical and academic formation of the resources and to consolidate such essential formation during their professional work stages is placing a bet to win in the future.

Some examples of wrong actions or omissions provoked by ignorance, lack of experience or lack of commitment to process safety  have also been included in this paper to illustrate the vulnerability of the systems whenever such situations are created.