A fire broke out at about 3 a.m. on conditioning equipment of the Four A Pierre (FAP) production line in an industrial bakery. The fire alarm sounded at 3:10 a.m.; the staff were notified and the firefighters called. After the site was evacuated, the manager and the onsite firefighting personnel attempted to contain the fire but were unsuccessful. The workshop was isolated, and the power supplies were shut off. The fire brigade, on site at 3:20 a.m., was able to bring the fire under control around 3:30 a.m. and ventilated the premises. The employees returned to the factory at 5:30 a.m. and the other production lines resumed their activity starting at 6:30 a.m.

The damage concerned only the FAP line’s packaging room: the equipment on which the fire started as well as the room’s structure (sandwich panels, lights, electrical cables), including the plastic parts that melted. The shutdown of the site’s production activity led to the destruction of bread products being processed, i.e. 8 tonnes.

The FAP production line was at a standstill because the technician from an external company had to weld a protective housing on a piece of the line’s equipment. The operation had started at around 1:30 a.m. When the operation was finished, at around 2 a.m., the technician left his workstation and returned 30 minutes later to check the equipment. The fire broke out at around 3 a.m. when the technician was absent. An inquiry was opened, and expert evaluations were conducted to determine the cause of the fire.

Corrosion of the equipment in the room, generated by the fire, as well as damage to the room,  required that certain equipment be decontaminated and others replaced. A preventive operation to stop the corrosion was initiated the next day with dehumidification of the damaged room. The operator also planned to bring the FAP packaging room into compliance with current standards.

The instructions regarding hot-spot work were not fully followed. The work area should have been made safer (tarpaulin, distance from combustible products, etc.) and post-operation follow-up should have been longer (1 hour without interruption of surveillance). The operator took the following measures:

• a campaign was launched to remind the internal crews and external companies of good practices when performing hot-spot interventions;
• installation of a smoke extraction hatch in the affected room despite its size (less than 300 m²);
• study of a fire alarm system and a sprinkler system in the room.