Answers from suppliers – what more should maritime be doing?

Craig Saywell, Ian McDonnell, Neil Charnock and Tommy Carnebo joined PSS Skills Lead, Angela Ward, for the final panel session at the EV maritime safety conference looking at ‘Answers from suppliers – what more should maritime be doing?’

“Awareness and training have to be the cornerstone of everything.”

Delegates heard from Craig Saywell at Remit Training who offers a range of technical, non-technical, and bespoke training, and apprenticeships. Craig spoke about how they are adding new technologies to their motor vehicle technician apprenticeships.

Ian McDonnell at EINTAC talked about the site visits, evaluations and training courses they offer as well as PPE, insulated tools, fire blankets and support to help organisations dovetail health and safety documents relating to high voltage electric and hybrid vehicles.

Neil Charnock at EV Fire Solution Services talked about how his organisation trains on early interventions in case of an EV fire and expressed concerns that there is very little guidance and legislation around them.

Tommy Carnebo at Dafo Vehicle Fire Protection spoke about his 21 years of experience as a professional firefighter in Stockholm and how far ahead Sweden and Norway are in terms of working with EVs. Tommy highlighted that the number of EVs in those countries are almost equal to the number of residents and therefore they have a wealth of valuable lessons that can be shared to allow others to learn from mistakes already made.

The panel highlighted and discussed three main areas:

• Awareness training for those transporting and handling EVs.
• Accidents and what is required when dealing with an EV catching fire.
• EVs and mobile plant used in port operations.

The panel was encouraged by the conversations at the conference and the presentations from ports on carrying out drills, buying equipment and taking up awareness training. They called for the maritime sector to ensure they make colleagues and employees aware of the risks they’re going to be facing on a daily basis as EVs become ever-more prevalent.

They discussed the lack of experience that some parts of the fire service have with regards to working on EV fires and the need for the maritime sector to work with local services to ensure everyone is aware of relevant guidance, equipment and training needs.

The panel recognised that training is applicable for all electric vehicles up to a point but that some training needs to include bespoke content for electric rubber tyred gantry cranes, container tugs, etc., As current certification is limited to light passenger vehicles, certification for specific EV training in maritime was raised as something to be explored in the future with PSS and the UK Chamber of Shipping and possibly provide recognition for training.

“Unfortunately, it often takes something catastrophic to bring about change. It’s good to see that people are coming together to bring things into the open, look at what’s needed and change things.”

The panel highlighted that every industry is playing catch up in the same way that maritime is and it will all depend on the seriousness that the maritime sector places on this. The emphasis again came back to training and awareness.