On the evening of November 24, the shift supervisor at the open-pit mine received an alarming call from the driver of the company's paramedic's medical station, requesting assistance in extinguishing a fire at his home.
After consultation with Deputy Director for Occupational Health and Safety Alexey Zelenin, a volunteer fire brigade (VFD) from the open pit mine was dispatched to the fire site in the village of Stary Karakn in a KAMAZ 620 truck, converted for firefighting purposes. By the time the fire department arrived, the local volunteer fire brigade had already begun extinguishing the fire. The fire was visible inside the house and had begun spreading to the roof.
Volunteers worked together to extinguish the fire from both sides of the house. After two fire and rescue units from the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations arrived, the driver of the DPD helped refill the professional firefighters' water trucks and returned to his regular duty station—the open-pit mine.
Thanks to the prompt actions of the enterprise's fire department, the damage to the home of a mine employee was minimized and the fire was prevented from spreading to a larger area.
"In almost three years as a fire brigade driver, this is my first response to a residential building. Before this, we'd only trained and extinguished small fires, like grass fires, at the open pit mine. But there weren't any particular difficulties extinguishing the house. It was unusual to operate at night. Otherwise, I followed the instructions. All the on-site forces responded quickly, so we were able to save my colleague's house—that's the most important thing," says Vladimir Avdeenko, a driver at the mine's fire department.
It should be noted that Vladimir worked for 20 years at the Vinogradovsky open-pit mine as a BelAZ driver and, after retiring, decided to continue working as a volunteer firefighter.
As a reminder, a volunteer fire brigade, equipped with a fire truck converted for firefighting purposes, was created on the basis of the Vinogradovsky open-pit mine's service vehicle convoy in June 2023.
The volunteers' vehicle contains primary fire extinguishing equipment, personal respiratory protective equipment, entrenching equipment, and other equipment necessary to localize open fires and contain the spread of fire until the main firefighting forces arrive. Volunteers' responsibilities also include promoting fire safety awareness and providing first aid to people injured in fires and emergency situations.
