Known for delivering exemplary fire protection expertise, Wormald is committed to ensuring Sydney Airport, Australia’s largest and most traffic-dense airport, maintains optimum fire safety and compliance.
Wormald has toasted the end of the year by securing an eight-year contract to operate as the on-site specialist fire service contractor for Sydney Airport.
As airports are complex multi-purpose sites carrying a slew of risk management requirements, Wormald is honoured to uphold the immense responsibility of seeing to Sydney Airport’s fire security and resilience for the foreseeable future.
Airports contain hundreds of tenancies and stakeholders, such as passenger-facing terminal areas, office buildings, hangars, workshops, cargo warehouses, multi-story car parks and aviation refuelling stations – all of which have specific fire hazards attached.
Fire safety plans at airports therefore cater to an array of key areas, including regulatory compliance, reliability and responsiveness, and developing a Health, Safety, Environment, and Quality (HSEQ) system and lifecycle cost analyses.
Additionally, interdisciplinary collaboration is essential in enacting airport fire safety plans – facility managers and contractors join forces to efficiently funnel resources in line with budget constraints.
Responsiveness of qualified technicians is imperative
Wormald’s specific responsibilities as chief fire-service contractors for Sydney Airport include routine inspection and testing of all fire equipment as per AS1851.2012 A1, routine inspection and testing of exit and emergency lighting as per AS 2293.2019, annual certifications in line with the New South Wales Environmental Planning and Assessment Act, repair and system upgrade works, and asset verification and lifecycle planning.
Sydney airport staff will undergo rigorous training to understand the process of notifying Wormald’s emergency call-out response team and on-site personnel in the event of emergencies.
Airport-specific obstacles for fire service
Wormald’s business development manager Antonio Serianni underlines the unique operational challenge posed by an airport’s alarm system, which Wormald’s fit-for-purpose system will seek to overcome.
“The ability to identify and immediately suppress a fire in airports is paramount and there is also importance placed on the design of alarm and evacuation systems due to the composition of secure and quarantined areas,” he says.
Serianni says Wormald’s reputable status as a titan in fire system maintenance places Sydney Airport in good stead to be an exemplar in airport fire service management.
“Through the design of fit-for-purpose systems and our expertise in complex fire system maintenance, we can identify and mitigate high-risk areas and support on-site workers to always put safety first,” he says.
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