Like many other motorists, it's second nature for me to use a mobile to take calls while I am driving. The subject of using mobiles while driving has been aired before, but what about petrol stations? I pulled into a petrol station recently, phone in shirt pocket and earpiece in place, deep in conversation. As I was reaching for the (diesel) nozzle there was an aggrieved rapping on the kiosk window and angry gesticulation. The meaning was clear; stop using the mobile, you idiot. Which I did.
OK, I was out of line, but exactly how dangerous is it really? Has anyone ever blown up a petrol station by using a mobile? Has anyone ever set fire to their beard while swigging scotch and taking a mobile call in the pub?
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in the USA petrol pumps are different
there is an outer pipe around the inner pipe which carries the fuel and through this outer pipe fuel vapour is sucked back into the forecourt fuel system
this drastically reduces chances of accidents re fuel vapour and sparks from electrical appliances etc
it is also much better for your health cos you dont breath it in
petrol vapour is very dnagerous and it doesnt take much to cause a big explosion
however i have seen many people using phones while filling up, and have had a go at one or two myself, plod are just as bad standing their using their radios next to pumps - all this is much more dangerous than doing 35 in a 30 but as ever all of the resources in the world go after speeders
would be easy to catch a few people and make examples using forecourt CVTV
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Very little or no wrisk ,petrol vapour is heavier than air so it sinks to the ground
and to ignite it must have the correct amount of oxygen.The greater risk is if you dropped the phone and it caused a spark in the battery as it fell apart.
Have ever noticed people smoking at filling stations even sat in the car its more dangerous,and most mulitple petrol stations use a UHF satalite down load for ordering and price changing.Heaps of electro smog around us all the time .
But I suppose having written this a station will blow up due to mobil phone
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Andy Bairsto wrote:
> But I suppose having written this a station will blow up due
> to mobil phone
In that case, I shall stop going to Mobil filling stations!
:>)
(I take it that was a Freudian slip, Andy...)
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So how many explosions have actually happened for this reason, then?
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Having used CB radio and mobile phones for about 10 years, I have never known either of them to generate a spark.
I would have thought that if there was any measurable danger then that would come from the electrical systems in the car itself e.g. starter motor, alternator, relays, switches, dodgy HT leads etc.
Having never heard of a petrol station spontaneously combusting, I would rate the risk at well below that of winning the lottery.
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well below winning the lottery as there is normally one winner a week but I have never heard of a petrol station blowing up.
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Quote: "Like many other motorists, it's second nature for me to use a mobile to take calls while I am driving". Not meaning to be pedantic or anything, but that is simply not true. I know full well this has been aired before, but people simply cannot concentrate properly whilst driving when they are deep into a phone conversation. Admit it, I bet when you get to an awkward junction, you pause your conversation for a few seconds?
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Richard
I don't think it's being pedantic and yes I would and do pause my conversation, either on the mobile or with a passenger. I don't see the difference. Surely you're not going to recommend driving solo all the time on the grounds of safety?
What about the school run? Unruly kids are a bigger distraction, surely?
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despite our reputation as being 3rd world, we have some intelligent laws (unfortunately the enforcement of them is close to non-existent!)
Driving using handhald cellphone use here is punishable with a R300 fine (about 80 litres of petrol, to use a motoring exchange rate!).
I've written before about "losing" 10 kms while driving along, talking on a hands-free kit - I don't remember ANYTHING about the road I'd travelled!
Nowadays, I keep in-car calls to a minimum - I point out that I'm driving, and can't talk, and get quite rude when people say "but I just want to tell you..."
I wonder how many serious collisions are caused by driver/phone-users - has anybody ever seen any reported?
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I'm with you there, Ian. If I call somebody on their mobile and find that they're driving, I ask them to call back when they next stop, then ring off.
Calls of the 'darling I'll be home in 10 minutes' and calls about 'work' aren't urgent enough to put my or other road users' lives in danger and I expect people to respect that.
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I wonder if it's fire safety they're really worried about, or the risk of interference with computers and telemetry via stray emissions (poor EMC protection)?
Ian
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Crazed
And what is the offence of using a mobile phone/radio at the petrol pumps? Please enlighten me.
This is all based around Health and Safety and 'Risk Assesment'. There is a very, very, very minor chance that some form of electrical spark could be generated. Its what is known as " covering ones backside."
Is it time for your medication?
Andrew.
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I think Ian Cook is onto something. It's not about safety although that is the excuse given. I remember a scam with CB radios, that if the send button was pressed while filling up it stopped the money increasing but the fuel delivery was not affected. Some people were getting rather cheap petrol! Not sure how true trhis is, but it was widely reported.
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Darcy,
For once I read all the other answers before I replied.
I was born in a filling station and have never been blown up once!
But what Andy Bairsto says above is the most accurate answer (apart from the typo's! (sorry, Andy)). Most people (in my experience) assume that the risk comes from 'static caused by radio waves causing a spark', but the real risk is from a dropped 'phone and the spark caused as the 'phone and battery part company.
And because the petrol vapour sinks to the ground, this is where there might be a build up of fumes.
Scoff you may (and you may scoff) but I don't use my mobile when filling up. What with all those boring hours driving, I've plenty of time to make calls.....(aaargh)...I'll just take another dried frog pill...
Martin.
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In my youth I briefly worked at a back street repair garage in East London, which had two petrol pumps. The foreman, all of 18 years old used to smoke away quite happily when filling cars at the pump. Well, if it was ok for him then why not for me, so I followed suit. I also remember both of us cleaning a brake drum with petrol while puffing away to our hearts content. I only worked there for a couple of months before going of to pastures new.
Many years later when back to the area to visit my mum I picked up the local rag, and there with a full page spread was Dave, my old foreman. Now older but instantly recogniseable he was pictured standing in front of the burnt out shell of his own repair business. He had been working underneath a car which had mysteriously caught fire, and though managing to extracate himself the car and the building were well ablaze by the time the fire brigade arrived. The fire was put down to a probable electricle fault in the car, in the absense of any other evidence, but I had to laugh as I wondered if his cavalier approach to the Factories Act had finally caught up with him.
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During the summer months i seem to get serious static electricity sparks from the cars bodywork when touching it. This also must be a bit dangerous at filling stations.
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I haven't heard this and I did wonder whether it was a product of the safety nanny police cum claim culture cum insurance.
In the Philippines (supposedly being put in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's largest sender of text messages), where driving with a phone glued to an ear, where many people own two or three phones (one they give out, one for the mistress/lover etc) where new SIM cards are available from any corner store and every one over the age of four has a cellphone, and all of whom are constantly texting, calling, playing some game, entering a phone co texting competition, etc etc, trying to implement rules like this at gas stations would be a hiding to nothing. Given the vast usage volume if the risk is really there by now we ought to have had an inferno somewhere in this country of some 40 million cellphones. As far as I know this is not the case. I would say the mobile BBQ vendors parked on the forecourt are probably more to worry about, or the cops smoking and sleazing in their mobile units behind the pumps.
For now I'll worry more about kidnappers, snatchers, carjackers, guys wanting change for forged 1000 peso notes, traffic altercations involving guns and just crossing the road.......
Sometimes one wonders whether the only safe way to conduct one's life is from one's bed. But then there's earthquakes, comets which are headed for earth, even falling out of bed. Please doctor I just can't sleep for worrying about all this...
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Must try that !
If it works it beats 4p a litre off for spending £100 in store.
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Most filling stations have an rf link from pump to till as opposed to cable under the forcourt. They would have been complaing about the interferance not the risk of fire / explosion.
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Big Vern's answer sounds more plausible.
I wonder which is most likely to cause petrol vapour ignition.........
Walking across the forecourt having a converstaion on the mobile or driving at walking pace in your spark ignition engine with various elctric motor brushes sparking away like the 5th November ? :-)
Modern cars may be better electrically insulated ( I don't know ) but what about older cars or motorbikes.
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PS I am not allowed to take my petrol engined vehicle on site at a large chemical complex ( diesels are allowed ) or use the mobile yet other portable walkie/talkie phones are allowed.
Cheers.
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And you may have hit the nail on the head, Pete.
All electrical equipment at refineries and chemical plants have to meet stringent anti fire and explosion conditions (special casings, etc.). The on-site radios will have to do likewise. Similar requirements will apply to electrical equipment at petrol stations.
I doubt that your average mobile phone will meet those conditions.
It may well be the case that a cell phone has never caused a fire at a petrol station and the chances of it doing so may be very small. On the other hand, asking people to do without appendages to their ears for a few minutes isn't excessive if it helps avoid that small risk.
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Quite correct Derek. This restriction is stipulated - as I understand it - by the local fire officer, not the station operators. In the UK, most fire brigades take their safety guidance from the London Fire & Safety Office. They're concerned about sparking, however generated and it seems to me to be not unreasonable to wish to minimize the risk of accident, however unlikely that may be.
Phil
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Sad person that I am, I happen to have a copy of HS(G) 41 - Petrol Filling Stations: Construction and Operation (I used to do a bit of work on petrol station IT honest!) and it tells us that:
...and all radio transmitting equipment (e.g CB radios, mobile telephones) should be restricted from operating at a filling station (nb radio tranmitting equipment could present a potential source of ignition if operated within the vicinity of dispensing equipment).
This restriction is to do with explosion prevention, not data corruption.
Phil
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Thanks, Phil. It's nice to get the exact position, not just speculation or fuzzy memory.
Ian
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Thanks Phil.
Informative post.
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To me this prohibition on mobile phone use at a garage really does seem like an exercise in "covering their backs".
Here, on the Shore Road near Belfast anyone can see an Esso station with, just a few metres behind it, a mobile phone cell mast. Just another example of the British disease, I suppose.
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The phone masts receive radio signals, which don't themselves cause sparks. If the mast is close enough to the petrol station for sparking to be a risk, then it will have to meet certain anti fire and explosion standards.
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Derek wrote:
>
> The phone masts receive radio signals, ......
??????? You what????? Mobile phone masts send and recieve signals, or am I the only person with a '2 way' mobile phone ?? :-)
>which don't themselves
> cause sparks.
??????
Derek you win my award for the oddest post, ever in the world, parts 1 2 and 3!!
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OK, so the masts send AND receive signals. I assumed that any mobile user would understand the concept.
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I know that Marks & Spencers at Sprucefiled N.Ireland had to get special tills in with extra shielding (or was it a faraday cage incorperated into the structure of the building.... can't remember it was too long ago) due to the proximity of the BBC transmitter!!
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I remember reading somewhere that although there is a definite risk of ignition due to an electrical spark, there is more risk of the station being struck by lightning twice in the same day!
Either they really are *that* safety conscious or there is another reason such as described by Vern. It would seem strange as to why they consider this such a hazard when surely there is much more likely a chance of a crazed madman with a flamethrower running into the petrol station, yet we dont see any kind of anti-guy-with-flamethrower measures on forecourts do we?
Its bound to be something to do with maximising profits in any case.
Cynically, Mark :)
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Anyone remember the nutter who approached a woman, who was fuelling her car, and asked for a lift?
When she refused, he took out a cigarette lighter and tried to ignite the petrol from her pump. Can't remember further details, but the fire was either easily contained or never happened. At the time, it made me think the hysteria over mobile phones must be unjustified.
If the problem is a spark from a dropped phone, why did an attendant run screaming from her kiosk when my son used his phone INSIDE my car while I was filling up? She said the licensing authority told her this was illegal.
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It is all about the explosion risk as Phil says. And it's not so much that it is *likely* to happen with a mobile phone, more that they will not be tested for use in a flammable or explosive environment to say it couldn't happen.
In a previous life I was responsible for first call attendance to potentially explosive situations. All our training was to minimise the risk of our actions causing further danger.
When entering a possible explosive environment we were unable to use our radios/phones and only certain items of our equipment were allowed in this situation.........the ones that were tested as "intrinsically safe"........even special torches.
Sometimes those involved in the situation without any training (ie. the public) would have already carried out actions that were deemed very risky. Thankfully I never experienced actual explosion from these actions but that didn't make them a good idea. Even small scale explosions can do a terrible amount of damage to people and property.
I'm happy to give the mobile a rest at the petrol station.
David
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All,
It occurred to me that static built up in the car as a result of wearing certain fibres in our clothes, can lead to an impressive spark discharge as the garments owner (initially unknowingly) earth themselves.
I cannot imagine that the risk is any less than that suggested by controls on the use of mobile phones at garages.
Julian L
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