Burnaby's Chevron refinery is opening a new fire hall - away from the storage area for refined oil products.
The move marks a departure from the old fire hall, which was located in a seismically unsound building inside the company's tank farm in north Burnaby.
"I'm so excited," said Mike Ward, the chief for Chevron's private fire department. "This is the first really true fire hall this facility has had."
The new fire hall will have several additional safety features, including a new exhaust system (to funnel fumes out of the hall) and an additional compressor to fill breathing apparati. The hall also has a room so the firefighters can fill their own extinguishers, and there's a large backup generator for power outages.
Chevron has had its own onsite fire department for decades, but it was housed in an old maintenance building that was not "earthquake proof," Ward said.
Chevron has two large but separate pieces of property on the Burrard Inlet: Area 1, which is the storage facility for refined products, and Area 2, which is the actual refinery to the east.
The original fire hall was located inside Area 1, but the new incarnation is about 1.5 kilometres down Penzance Drive, exactly half-way between Area 1 and 2, Ward explained.
According to Ward, Chevron decided to move the fire hall three years ago. Construction started last fall, and the new digs should be ready by mid-April.
Chevron has its own fire trucks, ladders and special foam and five full-time firefighters on site. There are also 86 "brigade members," which are people with regular jobs at Chevron, but they can be called on to fight fires and handle rescues and first aid.
The firefighters are usually previous Chevron workers who are familiar with the facility but have received special training to fight chemical fires, Ward explained.
Chevron can handle a "small event," Ward said but may call on the city's emergency responders if need be.
