Stringent processes

London Oxford Airport’s RFSS went through a stringent process of gearing up for certification to Category 6 status. Fire services manager Richard Oakes explains that the RFFS team made changes following the guidance of the UK CAA’s CAP1150, which describes the stages that should be considered when carrying out a Task and Resource Analysis (TRA), as to what is required in terms of qualified/competent personnel for delivering an effective airport rescue and firefighting service.
Using a qualitative risk-based approach focused on credible worst case scenarios, London Oxford Airport’s TRA sought to identify the numbers of personnel required to undertake response tasks in real time prior to support arriving from external services.
The RFFS TRA team worked through credible worse case scenarios to come to a qualitative risk assessment of principal objectives. Each of these scenarios was drilled in order to confirm a thorough understanding of what would be required.
London Oxford Airport also collaborated with the Durham Tees Valley-based International Fire Training Centre (IFTC) in a hot fire training exercise, Oakes informs. The resulting assessments identified the task criticality and pinch points that feed into personnel, equipment and vehicle requirements to support the RFFS’s objectives.
The CAA was incredibly supportive throughout, he says, and at the end of the process a CAA status change was approved with ‘Nil’ conditions.