The team, which has 12 people, undergoes regular training
Last year, the Belanovo Mining and Processing Plant (BGOK), part of the Ferrexpo Group, created a volunteer fire brigade. Yuriy Khymych General Director of BGOK and leader of Ferrexpo's corporate social responsibility projects in Ukraine, told Compraço in an interview.
«We have a good safety performance at Belanovo GOK. One of our initiatives last year was to create a volunteer fire brigade. Our employees undergo regular training and have already achieved the objective of arriving on site in less than 10 minutes», he stated.
According to Yuriy Khymych, in case of emergencies in the communities neighboring the plant (Nova Galeshchyna, Bondary, Ostaptsi and Vasylenky villages), the team provides assistance in eliminating their consequences. According to the Main Directorate of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in the Poltava region, BGOK firefighters were included in the Plan for the involvement of civil defense forces and means.
“Of course, we are not on the first line of call and response, but it is an additional element of confidence for the communities, because it is closer to us than Horishni Plavni or Kremenchuk,” explained Khymych.
The volunteer fire department is made up of 12 full-time company employees: power engineers, electricians and open-pit mining foremen. These people carry out their daily work tasks, but if necessary they will quickly arrive at the scene of the fire. The team members were trained at the Ferrexpo technical expertise center and were trained by a team of professionals from the Poltava Mining emergency rescue service, which serves Yeristovo GOK and is stationed on its territory.
Belanovo GOK purchased a modern off-road fire truck on a German MAN chassis for the volunteer fire department, which currently has no analogues in the region. It is equipped with everything necessary to quickly extinguish the fire, with a tank with a capacity of 5,000 liters of water, 400 liters of foaming agent and 120 liters of carbon dioxide.
Ferrexpo intends to pay annual bonuses to employees at the Group's Ukrainian factories: Poltava Mining, Yeristovo Mining and Belanovo Mining. The bonus will be equal to the average monthly salary and must be paid in the first quarter of 2024.
