EUROPEAN COMMISSION Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA) AGREEMENT NUMBER 814975 — LASH FIRE
Legislative assessment of fire safety risks and innovations in Ro-Ro ships
Ro-Ro ships are an important component of the global transport system and one of the most successful types of ships today. However, the high numbers of fire-related incidents on ro-ro ships in recent years and no signs of a decline require better fire protection systems. Based on a proposal from the European Commission, the International Maritime Organisation adopted a new agenda item for the Maritime Safety Committee in November 2016 entitled "Fire safety of ro-ro passenger ships" (MSC 97/19/3), and studies have been carried out to assess the critical aspects of previous ro-ro passenger ship fires.
There is also a need to address future challenges, including ongoing changes to cargo involving alternative fuel vehicles. In addition, similar fire safety challenges apply to all types of ro-ro vessels (not just passenger vessels), including vehicle carriers and ro-ro cargo vessels in general. It is, therefore, necessary to update the fire protection of ro-ro vessels from a broad and long-term perspective. There are important challenges to be addressed, but there is also great potential in the use of new and advanced technologies and procedures. Innovative solutions must be in balance with their effects on the environment, costs and crew operations in order to be considered for regulatory amendments. Then the fire safety of ro-ro vessels can be improved in a reliable manner, without the support of external intervention.
LASH FIRE brings together the relevant experience to meet the challenge of developing and demonstrating new procedures and technical innovations for use at sea. The goal of the project, in line with that of the IMO and other regulatory bodies, is to improve the safety of ro-ro ships significantly. In addition, LASH FIRE provides European industrial know-how to address the technical challenges posed by these updated rules, improving shipyards, systems suppliers, and other industries to develop and build safer and more competitive ships for sustainable transport.The project is based on a holistic approach to the problem and the following shall be researched:
- Effective manual operations: more effective fire management operations at all stages of a fire, including risk-based cargo detection and management, more efficient fire patrols and first responses, as well as effective firefighting.
- Intrinsically Safe Design: Improved designs for critical operations in the event of a fire, reducing the possibility of human error, accelerating time-sensitive tasks, and providing more complete and effective decision support.
- Ignition Prevention: Significant reduction of the most likely ignition sources and inflammable materials on the ro-ro platform, as well as the provision of automatic detection and risk-based cargo support systems.
- Detection: faster, more reliable and more robust technical means to detect, confirm, locate, and assess fires on all types of ro-ro platforms.
- Suppression: rapid suppression regardless of the deck, type of system, or crew size/presence.
- Containment: Elimination of major containment weaknesses, considering smoke, fire and heat integrity
In order for solutions regarding the adoption of regulations to be considered, their impact on risk and cost reduction will be assessed and advisory groups will be established with flag states and operators. Therefore, the project is expected to strengthen the independent fire protection of ro-ro vessels significantly and reduce the frequency of ro-ro vessel fires by 35% and the number of fatalities by 45%.
(OCT 13 2020) This video shows tests of Unifire AB's FlameRanger autonomous fire fighting robot--a fully autonomous and remote controlled fire monitor system, which automatically, and without any human intervention, detects and suppresses fire. As seen in the video, the system dynamically detects, follows, and suppresses fires in real time. It automatically turns the water on when fire is detected, and shuts the water off when it has been extinguished. The tests were conducted on June 9, 2020, at Guttasjön Fire training site, outside Borås, Sweden, as part of the EU Funded LASH FIRE project. The objective of these tests is primarily to determine the feasibility of a fully autonomous fire detection and suppression system to protect cargo on open weather decks on RoRo ships. Other objectives of the project include, among many others, comparing and determining the performance of various fire detection technologies, and assess their performance and usability as fire detection systems on RoRo weather decks. The project LASH FIRE (Legislative Assessment for Safety Hazards of Fire and Innovations in Ro-ro ship Environment) aims to develop maritime fire safety solutions with innovative technologies, operations and applications. The consortium is coordinated by RISE Research Institutes of Sweden and comprises 26 partners from 13 Member States of the European Union, including Unifire AB of Sweden and other industry partners, research institutes, universities, regulatory bodies, trade associations and experts in communication and external relations. LASH FIRE will provide a basis for the revision of international maritime regulations and gives European industry knowledge to build safer and more competitive ships for sustainable transport. The European Commission, via its research and innovation programme Horizon 2020, invests 12.2 million euro in LASH FIRE over 4 years, starting in September 2019. LASH FIRE has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 814975. For more information about the LASH FIRE project, see: lashfire.eu. For more information about the FlameRanger system, see: AutomaticFireFighting.com and UnifireAB.com.
(NOV 03 2020) Communication, information from WP03. The Lash Fire project webinar on “Fires in Alternatively Powered Vehicles onboard Ships” took place on 14 October 2020. With 240 participants it can be considered as a great success. The presentations, the results from the Mentimeter surveys and a compilation of the questions raised during the webinar and the answers from the respective speakers can be found on our website www.lashfire.eu.