Propane Safety – Why You Need Safety Cylinder Storage Cabinets
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Propane Safety – Why You Need Safety Cylinder Storage Cabinets
“You really need safety storage cylinder cabinets,” said Jorgenson Material Handling Owner Lance Jorgenson. “I remember my shop teacher telling me that he saw one of those propane cylinders igniting and it went through three concrete walls before it stopped.”
Boom.
That is how fast things can go bad when it comes to propane, gas and air cylinders being knocked over and turning into something you wish you never saw. For that reason there are strict codes and elaborate safety cylinder storage cabinets that your warehouse needs in order to be safe…
“Gas, propane, air and all the other things these cylinders can contain are potentially dangerous. The reason you need safety cylinder storage cabinets is because companies need to store these cylinders in a safe way that meets certain city and fire codes,” adamantly states Jorgenson. “And if you don’t have them, a lot of times the fire department and fire marshal will not sign off on your business or occupancy permit.” If you don’t have those certain safety codes met; you don’t do business.
“Installing these also helps protect you because the cylinders are so dangerous because if they fall over they can break and it allows the contents to leak or rush out and it’s basically like a rocket going off and can cause significant damage,” Jorgenson adds.
There are many designs when it comes to safety storage cabinets.
“These cages are designed to basically keep those cylinders upright so they don’t fall over, explode or take off. The closed-sided, flammable ones with doors are designed so you can keep gas, or whatever is flammable, in the storage cabinet and it will keep it contained,” said Jorgenson.
“Having either a safety cylinder storage cabinet, or flammable storage cabinets are beneficial so if there is a fire, the fire marshal knows where all the chemicals and dangerous materials are in the building, so they can just stick a hose in that cabinet and flood the area. And they know where all the chemicals are in that one location rather than having chemicals, propane, gas, etc all across the facility and they don’t have a chance to contain it because it’s spread all across the building with gas here, propane there, other chemicals in other places. A safety cylinder storage cabinet helps them know where everything is located,” states Jorgenson.
Jorgenson Material Handling has installed hundreds of these safety storage cabinets where they have met code and kept workers safe.
“Yes, we can certainly help,” said Jorgenson. “We can come out and usually each chemical or cylinder will have a spec sheet and with that we can go talk to the manufacturers and find out codes we need to follow and which safety cabinets we need to install that will best suit those requirements that they have.”
Again, the best act of prevention is keeping theses propane, gas and air cylinders upright.
“These cabinets are designed to keep cylinders upright and basically the main concern of those cylinders is that they don’t’ fall over because if the valve on top breaks, the cylinder basically becomes a missile so the cabinets keep them upright,” adds Jorgenson who firmly believes that no life is worth saving a few bucks. “Well you’re dealing with people’s lives. And if cylinders are just sitting there without a protective storage area and a forklift bumps it so it falls over and that will easily snap the value off and if that valve ruptures, then that could very well cost someone their life.”
If you are looking to make your warehouse safer by installing these cabinets, then Lance also recommends taking a hard look at safety guards as well.
“We also do the safety guarding for areas frequented by forklifts and that helps keep the forklifts away from those areas so we can put some heavy duty guarding up around places like that, as well as offices in warehouses to protect people there too,” Jorgenson concludes. “You can create a walkway so that people aren’t walking out into highly trafficked areas by the forklifts.”
From all of us here at Jorgenson Material Handling, we just want to help you create the safest work environment possible, at the most economical and competitive price–so give us a call today and inquire about safety cylinder storage cabinets.
