NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY AFFAIRS DIVISION OF FIRE SAFETY OFFICE OF THE STATE FIRE MARSHAL SAFETY ALERT PO Box 809, Trenton, NJ 08625-0809 (609) 633-6070 SAFETY ALERT #21-1 SAFETY ALERT Scott AV-3000 HT Facepiece Issued February 24, 2021 The New Jersey Division of Fire Safety has received reports from several departments throughout the state regarding cracking of the polycarbonate lens component of some Scott AV-3000 HT facepiece assemblies.
The departments are primarily reporting initial cracks in the inlet area at the inlet port where the breathing regulator is attached. Some chipping and cracking have also been reported to “spider” further into the lens which can create a penetrable fracture of the lens thus allowing air to escape. As of this Alert, the Division has not received any reports of injury or death resulting from the cracking described above. This cracking has not been reported to have occurred following any unexpected events where the facepiece could have been struck or crushed, or regulators/adapters forced into the inlet port.
The reporting agencies have done internal checks to attempt to identify if these cracks could be due to operational misuse, improper storage and/or broken regulators/adapters. These checks did not confirm any potential systemic causes of the cracks as of this Alert. 3M/Scott has been advised of this issue and has launched an investigation from an engineering and production perspective.
The NJ Division of Fire Safety is recommending all agencies utilizing this equipment direct their members to conduct an immediate and ongoing inspection of their facepieces, following the guidelines in the published 3M Scott User Instructions and report any negative findings to their department heads and, in turn, department heads should forward those findings for tracking purposes to Vince Campagna at vincent.campagna@dca.nj.gov.
Link to official announcement below:
https://www.firefighterclosecalls.com/download/243/tsl-files/369252/safety-alert-21-1-scott-av-3000-ht-facepiece-2021-1.pdf