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Emergency Rescuer Occupational Qualification study materials
Emergency Rescuer Occupational Qualification study resources

Emergency Rescuer Occupational Qualification: Fire, hazardous materials and special incident response

Emergency Rescuer Occupational Qualification · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.

All guide sections

Fire, hazardous materials and special incident response

Fire, hazardous materials, and special incidents test whether you can recognize what is burning or leaking, choose the right control method, and keep yourself and the public out of the hazard's reach.

Core rules

  • Fire needs fuel, oxygen, heat, and an uninhibited chemical chain reaction; removing any one extinguishes it. Flashover is the sudden full-room ignition of all contents; backdraft is the explosive reignition when oxygen enters a hot, fuel-rich space, signalled by smoke puffing and inward air movement.
  • Extinguisher use follows PASS: pull, aim at the base, squeeze, sweep. Match the class: A solids, B flammable liquids, C energized electrical, D metals, K cooking oils. Never use water on energized electrical equipment, cooking oil, or burning metals.
  • Hazardous materials: identify from placards, labels, UN numbers, container shape, and the Emergency Response Guidebook. Establish isolation and protective action distances, work upwind and uphill, and do not commit until the substance and its behaviour are known.
  • Use hot, warm, and cold zones and set up decontamination before anyone enters. Gross decontamination precedes technical decontamination.
  • Special incidents: electrical (isolate before touching), confined space, water, and deliberate releases each add a specific hazard and require specialist resources.

Worked example

A tanker is leaking from a damaged dome; the placard shows a flammable liquid and a UN number. Reasoning: park upwind and uphill at a distance, keep ignition sources away, identify the substance from the guidebook, set isolation and protective action distances, deny entry, request a hazmat team, and prepare decontamination and a cold-zone casualty collection point. Do not attempt to plug the leak.

Traps

  • Attacking a flammable liquid fire with water and spreading it.
  • Approaching from the low side of a leak where vapours collect.
  • Treating a placarded vehicle as an ordinary traffic incident.
  • Skipping decontamination because the casualty is only slightly exposed.
  • Entering a hot zone without the PPE level the substance demands.