On 8 February, Day 44 of its voyage to Antarctica, the naval research ship Sv. Sv. Kiril i Metodii (RSV421) held a fire-fighting exercise. Held while RSV 421 was making progress towards the Deake Passage, it was part of the ship’s survivability exercises, which can be either fire-fighting or flood-fighting.
The exercise involved the deck crew, which acts as an emergency party in such cases, as well as the technical sector’s emergency fire safety group.
Earlier during the voyage, Lt. Stanislav Stefanov, theship’s logistics officer and member of the emergency fire safety group, explained to BTA that RSV 421 is equipped with portable firefighting equipment – three types of extinguishers, and two fixed systems – one with seawater which is used for cooling and in rare cases also for extinguishing, and a carbon dioxide system that can be used to suppress fire in the engine room of NIC 421. One emergency party and one emergency group have been organized on board the ship, and they are equiped with various fire-fighting gear: fire-resistant clothing, lanterns, axes, helmets and emergency oxygen systems.
RSV421 is on a voyage to Livingston Island where it will support the Bulgarian Antarctic expedition.
BTA’s Daily News editor Konstantin Karagyozov is the only member of the media who is travelling on board the ship to Livingston Island and back and will cover the Bulgarian expedition on site throughout the stay in Antarctica.
All media outlets can use the Bulgaria-Antarctica BTA’s Log for free.
