Safety Plans and Standards of Operations of the Movement of Large Vehicles on the Roads

Unit VII course project
Ronald M Reeves Jr
Dr. Heather Frost
Columbia Southern University
MOS 5640
Due date
Introduction
Every state in the United States is experiencing large vehicles traveling on their roads, also shared by children, the elderly and other motorists. The large vehicles, often carrying hazardous materials, may collide with other vehicles, a solid structure, or pedestrians. According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (2018), about 5096 huge trucks and buses were involved in mass casualty events in 2018. Thus, mass casualty events, such as the one involving a school bus and two trucks on Highway 182 in Orange Beach, Alabama, are not isolated cases, which present various problems to emergency responders. With road traffic injuries accounting for the deaths of more than a million people worldwide, employing the following concise response technique in this mass casualty event will help save the lives of the school children.
Size-up the scene
In response to a 9-1-1 call on the accident, the city of Orange Beach rolled out the Orange Beach Fire department, including the emergency medical services (EMS) in the department to the accident scene. The emergency responders set up a command base and begun assessing the scene. From their observation, the present danger was that a bus almost full of middle school children had sustained major crashes due to the collision, and two trucks with their drivers in them, had overturned on the road. Additionally, apart from fuel and pieces of glasses all over the road, was an unknown liquid product leaking from one of the truck and a white granulated compound from the other truck. A closer look at the tanker truck established that it was transporting benzene, while the white granulated product was identified as ammonium nitrate.
According to Bevelacqua and Norman (2019, pp.), benzene is a colorless and aromatic liquid. It comprises six carbon atoms connected by bonds; it liquefies at a temperature of 5.5 °C, boils at 80.1 °C; thus, based on the Orange Beach, Alabama weather during the accident, the compound would still be liquid in form. Also, it does not mix water but does with organic solvents, and upon ignition, it burns with a sooty flame (Bevelacqua & Norman, 2019). On the other hand, Ammonium Nitrate is a white crystalline powder with a melting point of 169.6 °C and a boiling point of 210 °C. Thus it will still be solid even with Alabama’s weather. The chemical comprises two ions soluble in water; it absorbs water and is relatively stable (Bevelacqua & Norman, 2019).
Based on the discovery of the characteristics of these two chemicals, a call to dispatch was made for the nearby hospitals to be ready for mass casualties. The children in the bus and the bus drivers were assured they would be okay as the fire department developed a plan to move in.
Safety plans and standards of operations.
Based on Environmental Response Guidelines in Alabama, response to incidents of hazardous materials spills should be reported and handled immediately to prevent a further threat to the environment and the residents. Thus, based on these guidelines, the fire first responders identified the isolation zone on the other side of the road on the grass and a contamination corridor on the road before the isolation zone to avoid contamination of the area.
The best protection for the children in the school bus from the two chemical compounds is by evacuating them from the bus. Benzene, an organic compound, belongs to the family of aromatic hydrocarbons. It is made up of unsaturated hydrocarbons ring structures, exhibiting its atypical stability due to its aromatic property. The compound is extremely flammable and volatile and reacts aggressively with oxidants, nitric acid, resulting in fire and explosions. Exposure to it for about ten to twenty minutes causes drowsiness, dizziness, irregular heartbeat, and headaches. Tremors, confusion, loss of consciousness, and irritability can occur once you breathe in benzene. If inhaled in high concentration can lead to death (Macdonald, 2004, pp. 182-185)
Ammonium nitrate, an inorganic compound, is a reasonably stable compound under normal conditions but explosive when h...