NFPA Journal - September/October 2019 - 30

CLOSE
QUARTERS

HAVE THIS
"PEOPLE
MISCONCEPTION THAT

I

T'S A SUNNY AFTERNOON
in late July, and Jeffrey Post
and I are out for a drive. Post is
assistant fire chief at the Naval
Submarine Base New London
in Groton, Connecticut, the US
Navy's primary submarine base on the
East Coast. He mentions various points
of interest as he steers his pickup truck
south along Military Highway, toward
the mouth of the Thames River and
the Port of New London. Out the passenger-side window, the waters of the
Thames glisten deep blue.
Post nods at structures that hug the
river's shore and at areas where the
river narrows, including one a little
more than 300 yards wide, where
Interstate 95 runs over the Gold Star
Memorial Bridge. On the other side of
the river, the New London side, I can see
the long, gray, slab-like piers that regularly welcome large cargo vessels that
arrive from around the world, hauling
everything from salt to oil to hazardous
chemicals. The salt ships, in particular,
need a lot of maintenance, Post says.

30 | NFPA JOURNAL * S E P T E M B E R / O C T O B E R 2 0 1 9

His comment suggests the purpose of
our ride, which is to survey what could
happen to this placid stretch of New
England river in the event of a fire,
explosion, or other major marinerelated incident. Maintenance on cargo
ships-and many other types of vessels-can trigger fires or explosions,
Post says, and fires on large vessels,
including the submarines housed at
his base, are something Post spends a
lot of time thinking about. The most
challenging fire he ever responded to
was a 2012 blaze on the USS Miami,
a 26-year-old nuclear submarine that
was drydocked for maintenance at a
US Navy shipyard in Maine. The fire,
intentionally set by a civilian worker,
gutted the 362-foot-long vessel, inflicting $450 million in damage and forcing
the Navy to scrap the sub.
While a fire of that magnitude has
never occurred at the Groton sub base
or the Port of New London-or any port
in the United States in recent history,
for that matter-Post worries about
what could happen if one did. As we

drive, Post calls attention to homes,
restaurants, businesses, parks, ferry
terminals, and infrastructure like major
highways and bridges-all of it in
harm's way in a major event. Although
the Port of New London isn't especially
large compared to other US ports-it's
not even ranked in the top 100 in terms
of annual trade tonnage-it's still a
major economic boon to Connecticut,
which has invested tens of millions of
dollars into the port's infrastructure in
recent years. A major fire or explosion
there could have a devastating economic impact.
"People have this misconception
that if a fire or explosion happens on a
boat, even in a port, it'll be contained,"
Post tells me. "But that's not necessarily true." His concern makes me think
of a marine disaster from a century
ago-the 1917 explosion that destroyed
much of Halifax, Nova Scotia. In that
incident, a munitions ship heading into
the port of the Canadian city collided
with another vessel, resulting in an
enormous explosion that destroyed

GETTY IMAGES

IF A FIRE OR EXPLOSION
HAPPENS ON A BOAT,
EVEN IN A PORT,
IT'LL BE CONTAINED,
BUT THAT'S NOT
NECESSARILY TRUE."
NFPA Journal - September/October 2019

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