MARINA DI CARRARA – A port fire drill was held this morning, Friday, organized by the Marina di Carrara Coast Guard in collaboration with the Massa-Carrara provincial fire department. The drill is part of the periodic training activities that the Maritime Authority coordinates to verify the efficiency of the port fire plan and to test the efficiency of the planned intervention procedures, always keeping the list of available human and material resources updated. The scenario hypothesized for this drill involved the involvement of a local shipyard, as an important production facility operating within the port of Marina di Carrara: the drill was activated by the Operations Room of the Marina di Carrara Harbour Master’s Office at 11:00, immediately after receiving a telephone report from the manager of the shipyard “Ornic Nautica Srl”, of a fire on board a fiberglass vessel moored within the docks of the port of Marina di Carrara in order to carry out maintenance work.
The safety procedures envisaged by the port fire prevention plan were implemented in a very short time under the coordination of the operations room of the Port Authority of Marina di Carrara: the quay managers’ fire prevention equipment was immediately ready and the emergency operational units were alerted of the Fire Brigade, of the National Health 118 of Massa-Carrara and of the operations room of the Single Emergency Number of the Tuscany Region. The Maritime Authority immediately ordered the dispatch of land patrols to the site of the fire and the exit of the M/V CP 554 to provide fire-fighting assistance from the sea, to evacuate any people present on board the unit and to interdict traffic entering/exiting the port; furthermore, the intervention of the port services units was arranged, specifically the tug “Francesco Neri”, for the possible removal of the burning naval unit in order to prevent the fire from spreading to the numerous boats moored nearby. During the exercise, the Marina di Carrara Fire Brigade team, which intervened with two land vehicles, perfected the containment and extinguishing operations of the fire, already started by the on-board staff and the quay concessionaires.
The exercise – which had the aim of testing the level of training of the staff, as well as monitoring the efficiency and functionality of the fire-fighting vehicles immediately and directly available in the port area – ended at 12:00 with the complete extinction of the fire. fire and the reclamation of the flooded ship premises, promoting cooperation between port operators and the institutions involved in the management of port emergencies. The operations room of the Coast Guard of Marina di Carrara has constantly provided updates to the Prefecture of Massa-Carrara and to the Operations Room of the Maritime Directorate of Tuscany, for the necessary safety coordination. At the end of the exercise, a debriefing was held with all the participating actors, during which the technical and operational aspects that emerged during the training activity were analysed. The commander of the Port Authority – frigate captain Monica Selene Mazzarese – thanked all the public and private entities who contributed to the success of the exercise, the execution of which was fully satisfactory with respect to the emergency plans and protocols in force.
