2007, Piran, Slovenia
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2007, Piran, Slovenia

2007, Piran, Slovenia 2007, Piran, Slovenia

lboro.ac.uk
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Environmental Ergonomics XII Igor B. Mekjavic, Stelios N. Kounalakis & Nigel A.S. Taylor (Eds.), © BIOMED, Ljubljana 2007 results also showed that the mean performance time of the 'search-and-rescue' task during the combined bicycle ergometer test / ‘search-and-rescue’ task was 6,2% higher when compared to the single ‘search-and-rescue’ task. Table 2 Results of search and rescue task 198 Search and rescue with pre-exercise Search and rescue without pre-exercise Mean SD Min Max Mean SD Min Max Tcore (°C) 37.9 0.3 38.4 37.4 0.4 38.2 0.00 Δ Tcore (°C) 0.31 0.14 0.59 0.37 0.08 Tskin (°C) 36.4 0.8 33.4 1.4 0.54 RPE 13.6 1.5 11 15 13.0 1.3 11 15 0.08 TS 1.9 0.7 1 3 2.5 1.2 1 4 0.49 Perf.time (mm:ss) P- value 15:07 00:29 14:39 15:43 14:44 01:00 12:47 15:37 0.38 DISCUSSION The main conclusion that can be drawn, is that heat stress is a multidimensional problem, but that the main cause of the problems, as previously determined by these fire fighters, is not their protective clothing. We noticed that behavioural aspects of fire fighters are more important in causing heat stress. It is concluded that moderate, non-fire fighting related exercise prior to a fire fighting task leads to a higher core temperature during fire fighting. Consequently, earlier onset of symptoms of heat stress during a common fire fighting task then may occur. The conclusions on the sub questions are as follows: Textile properties may change in time due to use and ageing; most important is the decreased water vapour permeability. Decreased water vapour permeability may lead to a worse evaporation and subsequently to an increase in heat load on the body. However the duration of smoke diving tasks is generally shorter than is predicted by THDYN even with the deteriorated water vapour membrane. Changes in the other properties of the textile material of the garments in this study are of minor influence on the thermal load of the fire fighter. The structured interviews showed that heat stress is a multidimensional problem that can be divided into two main categories, namely human related causes and technical causes. However the seriousness of the problem of heat stress is often still not recognised. The common thought is that it is part of the job. The experiments on the influence of pre-exercise showed that elevated exercise levels prior to a fire fighters’ search and rescue task may lead to shorter exposure times. More research to the heat balance of fire fighters on duty is needed to regulate the work rest cycles of their job. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank the Amsterdam Fire Brigade for their financial support of this study and the cooperative participation of the fire fighters in the experiments.

Personal protective equipment REFERENCES Bos J.; Mol, E.; Frings-Dresen, M.H.W. en Visser, B. (2001). Study to physical and medical task requirements for selection and training of fire fighting personnel for repressive duties. Phase 2 (in Dutch). Coronel Instituut/ERGOcare. Report 02-06. Hartog, E.A. den, (2001). Exposure duration of fire fighters (in Dutch). TNOrapport TM-01-C035, Soesterberg, the Netherlands. Lotens, W.A., (1993). Heat transfer from humans wearing clothing, PhD-thesis Technische Universiteit Delft. Pandolf, K.B., Sawka, M.N. and Gonzalez, R.R. (2001). Human Performance Physiology and Environmental Medicine at Terrestrial Extremes, Cooper Publishing Group, Traverse City MI, USA. 199

Personal protective equipment<br />

REFERENCES<br />

Bos J.; Mol, E.; Frings-Dresen, M.H.W. en Visser, B. (2001). Study to physical and<br />

medical task requirements for selection and training of fire fighting personnel for<br />

repressive duties. Phase 2 (in Dutch). Coronel Instituut/ERGOcare. Report 02-06.<br />

Hartog, E.A. den, (2001). Exposure duration of fire fighters (in Dutch). TNOrapport<br />

TM-01-C035, Soesterberg, the Netherlands.<br />

Lotens, W.A., (1993). Heat transfer from humans wearing clothing, PhD-thesis<br />

Technische Universiteit Delft.<br />

Pandolf, K.B., Sawka, M.N. and Gonzalez, R.R. (2001). Human Performance<br />

Physiology and Environmental Medicine at Terrestrial Extremes, Cooper<br />

Publishing Group, Traverse City MI, USA.<br />

199

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