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All recommendations made by Inspectorates regarding the Moerdijk fire adopted in full

Press release | 24-08-2011

All recommendations made by the Public Order and Safety Inspectorate and the Labour Inspectorate are supported and will be acted upon. The municipality of Moerdijk, the Mid- and West-Brabant Safety Region as well as the Executive Committee of the Veiligheidberaad have taken up all recommendations in full as well. On behalf of the Cabinet, Mr Opstelten, the Minister of Security and Justice, has informed the Lower House of Parliament accordingly, in reaction to the Inspectorates’ reports regarding the fire at Chemie-Pack in Moerdijk. Mr Opstelten expresses his appreciation of the providers of emergency assistance and the regional administrators involved, for making an all-out effort to do their jobs under difficult circumstances. According to the Minister, the results of the investigations are worrying.

Immediately after the fire, the Safety Region and the municipality of Moerdijk took a number of measures and made provisions aimed at improving the quantitative and qualitative input of the fire brigade: the availability and degree of alert of fire fighters – available for the Moerdijk industrial site – have been expanded; an accelerated tendering procedure has been started for specialist material (foam fire extinguisher vehicle); arrangements have been made with the Rotterdam-Rijnmond Safety Region and the DCMR Environmental Protection Agency for necessary advice and assistance. The municipality of Moerdijk and the Safety Region made immediate arrangements with the Regional Environmental Protection Agency West-Brabant to intensify enforcement and supervision, especially for companies presenting major risks (Major Accidents (Risks) Decree 1999, Brzo). A choice was made not to await the results of the investigations, but to take action with a minimum of delay.

As for the central government, the Minister supports the development of expert regions for the fire brigade. With a view to the events in Moerdijk, Mr Opstelten wants to have more interregional cooperation in the fields in which specialist knowledge and skills are needed. Additionally, he announced that the division of tasks and duties between all parties regarding the mutual exchange of information will be reassessed. Together with the Executive Committee of the Safety Preparation, the present GRIP structure (Coordinated Regional Procedure for Incidents Control) will be designed to enhance uniformity in and coordination of the scaling between the safety regions themselves. The central government’s role in the event of interregional incidents or an (inter)national impact will be included in the scaling structure as well (the so-called GRIP 5).

Finally, the Mid- and West-Brabant Safety Region has taken measures to include the safe handling of chemical and hazardous substances in the training programme, in reply to the recommendations of the Labour Inspectorate. Safe working during an incident will be monitored more intensively in all safety regions. The same applies to the police.

No statements have been made about the question of whether the company committed a criminal offence. The criminal investigation is still in progress. However, the Public Order and Safety Inspectorate stated that on the basis of the permits, the company was not permitted to have hazardous substances present on the site. The fact that this was the case anyway, and that the substances caused a fire, is therefore the company’s responsibility entirely. Additionally, when the first fire engine arrived at the site, the fire was already underway to such an extent that to start fighting it was pointless. The business could certainly not have been saved.

Report of the Public Order and Safety Inspectorate

The Public Order and Safety Inspectorate carried out an investigation into controlling (the effects of) the fire at Chemie-Pack on 5 January 2011. The Public Order and Safety Inspectorate found that, initially, the municipality of Moerdijk and, at a later stage, the Mid- and West-Brabant Safety Region were not properly prepared for actual risks. For instance, the risks in the municipality of Moerdijk were insufficiently linked to the preparation for disaster management and crisis control and the organisation of the fire fighting services and deficiencies in the management and coordination of the actual fire fighting have been established, both on the operating level and in administration, and on a national level there was insufficient control over the gathering of information.

The Public Order and Safety Directorate also concluded that the Mid- and West-Brabant Safety Region did not adequately fight the fire, especially in the stabilisation and normalisation phase. As it happens, this did not immediately affect the final outcome: the fire was of such an extent that it is certain that the business could not have been saved. However, the environment has been damaged more severely due to the large amounts of water used for the fire fighting. Both Inspectorates have concluded that it was irresponsible not to have started a decontamination procedure, with a view to the risks of contaminated water for the emergency assistance providers.

The Public Order and Safety Inspectorate has reached the conclusion that the incident in Moerdijk calls for a further investigation into the manner in which the regional and the national level must be adequately linked, especially with regard to the organisation of crisis communication and the performance of the nationally operating services. The Dutch Safety Board will discuss these aspects in its report, which is expected to be presented by the end of December 2011.

Report of the Labour Inspectorate

The Labour Inspectorate monitored the safety of the emergency assistance providers during the fire fighting, further to signs of health problems of emergency assistance providers in the days following the fire. The Labour Inspectorate has found that the employers concerned did not pay sufficient attention in advance to informing the emergency assistance providers about hazardous substances, as a result of which there was insufficient knowledge and awareness of the risks involved at the time of the deployment. The Labour Inspectorate has also established that during the fire insufficient attention was paid to working safely and to the procedures for an incident involving hazardous substances, such as the decontamination procedure. One of the duties of the supervising Safety Region is the supervision of labour conditions during the fire fighting. This supervision was been carried out adequately. The Labour Inspectorate requires the employers concerned to take measures in respect of these issues.